Twenty-five years after his cult TV series, Kir Royal, director Helmut Dietl has now come released a sort of ?sequel? for the big screen. Zettl focuses on the high-flying career of a ruthless media man in Berlin. As satire, however, the frigid figures in Zettl fail to warm up to viewers. ...
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Turkish-born German sociologist Necla Kelek has been accused of painting the Turkish community in Germany in a bad light. In an interview with Michaela Schlagenwerth, she explains that what she sees is what she writes. More dangerous than her portrayal, she says, is the pervasive blindness to the facts. (Photo Lebeck)
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Like hero, like author. Ilija Trojanow, world traveller, author of travel books and Mecca pilgrim, has written an astounding biographical novel about Richard Francis Burton, Mecca pilgrim, author of travel books and world traveller. By Karl-Markus Gauß
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Far from the over-exitement of today's artworld, the 4th berlin biennale for contemporary art wallows in the dark depths of things jettisoned and biographical, offering the art pilgrim twelve stations along Berlin's Augustraße. By Hanno Rauterberg
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Former GDR dissident and poet Wolf Biermann is pleasantly disappointed that a young aristocratic Wessi like Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck can breathe such convincing life into the Stasi phantoms of his past. The film "The Life of Others" might just be the start of Germany's properly in-depth confrontation with its second dictatorship. Winner of the 2007 Oscar for Best Foreign Film
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Grit your teeth and head out for a night of guerilla clubbing in wind-chilled Berlin. But expect low-key rather than excess, ping-pong not stage diving. By Phuong Duong
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Citizenship tests are now all the rage in Europe. Britain and the Netherlands have made tests mandatory, and Germany is thinking of following suit. But opponents claim the proposed questions unfairly target Muslims and could not be answered by many Germans. Are you fit to become German? Find out with the 100 questions proposed by the German state of Hesse.
Send us your answers to: editor@signandsight.com. Thekla Dannenberg, editor and clever-clogs in German politics and history, will review your applications and notify you of her decision.
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Europe must pluck up the courage to introduce reforms. It needs its own
armed forces and foreign minister, a directly-elected president and an
independent financial basis. These should be decided on by a referendum
binding only in states where a majority had voted in favour. We present
excerpts from a speech in which Jürgen Habermas calls on Europe to act - and sketches a critique of the Internet.
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In an arresting new play, five young Muslim women lift the veil on a taboo: sex. Director Neco Celik talks to Michaela Schlagenwerth about his own conflict with Islam and why he chose this explosive material for his first play.
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Viola player Volker
Hagedorn has toured with Bach far off the beaten track, a world away from the spoiled European metropolises. He describes the joys of Johann Sebastian, the relaxed travel companion and the joy he brings to the musically-under nourished.
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As Germany toys with the idea of introducing tests to screen prospective immigrants, Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht cautions not to confuse rules with culture and asks: what is the norm, anyway?
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Detlev Buck's latest film "Tough Enough" is set in Berlin's notoriously hard-edged Neukölln district. In an interview with Daniela Sannwald, the director talks about urban ghettos, language barriers and the mafia.
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Since it hit the German screens in February, Serdar Akar's Turkish secret agent film "Valley of the Wolves" has been widely touted as an anti-Western hate film. But for all the talk of a "clash of civilisations", isn't it much like any Western thriller - with the roles reversed? By Alexandra Stäheli.
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Religion is en vogue today, while the Enlightenment suffers from a major shortcoming: it has a stock of efficient ideas, but no impressive images. In a word, it is not television-compatible. Yet the enlightened world we live in is one where even those opposed to it would like to live. By Heinz Schlaffer
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This year's Berlin Film Festival proved that director Dieter Kosslick is honouring his committment to be political, proportional and popular. Ekkerhard Knörer only regrets that aesthetic criteria got left by the wayside.
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Jafar Panahi's "Offside" blows the whistle on female football fans in Iran. In Claude Chabrol's "Comedy of Power", a muck-raking Isabelle Huppert comes up against the fattest cats of all. And Amir Muhammad's "The Last Communist" portrays over 80 people before finding just that.
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