The new film from Helmut Dietl

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. ... more more

GoetheInstitute

The avant-garde of hard

Monday 22 August, 2005

Berlin rappers Bushido, Sido, Fler and others shock with obscene and gruesome lyrics. How dangerous is Hauptstadt Rap? By Thomas Groß

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Making multiculturalism work

Wednesday 17 August, 2005

Should Islamic schoolgirls be excused from gym class in German schools? Should the Muezzin's call to prayer ring as loudly as the church bells in German towns? Jutta Limbach, former President of Germany's Federal Constitutional Court, sees multiculturalism on the wane in Germany. In view of the growing terrorist threat, she makes a plea for the protection of the rights of the minority, not the majority.
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Merkel's a total cutie!

Monday 15 August, 2005

Christoph Schlingensief's controversial "Parsifal" is showing at the Wagner Festival for the second year running. He talks to Tina Hildebrandt and Stephan Lebert about hero impersonators in politics, zombies in Bayreuth and pre-election Germany.
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Do you want to die with me?

Thursday 11 August, 2005

Burned down and raised from the ashes three times: the fabrik Potsdam produces Gemany's most courageous dance theatre. By Evelyn Finger
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Attack of the killer disks

Monday 8 August, 2005

The future of cinema is threatened by the rise of the DVD. But cinema is also working hard at its own downfall. By Georg Seeßlen
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A sight for sore eyes

Monday 1 August, 2005

The New Leipzig School is the new black. It paints the dark side of the fun society and sells like hotcakes. Christian Schüle dissects the myth.
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Hero to zero

Wednesday 27 July, 2005

This year's Bayreuth Festival opened with a new interpretation of Wagner's "Tristan and Isolde" by Swiss director Christoph Marthaler. The stakes were high; the last Tristan, by Heiner Müller, enjoyed iconographic status. And for Hans-Klaus Jungheinrich, this year's performance was an unspectacular failure, with the notable exception of Nina Stemme's brilliant Isolde.
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Between the Sex Pistols and the Koran

Tuesday 26 July, 2005

In the wake of terrorist attacks, people who plead for a dialogue between religions are avoiding the key question: why do Muslims become terrorists? By Zafer Senocak
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Goya's ghouls

Thursday 21 July, 2005

Berlin stages the most comprehensive show of the Spanish master ever seen in the German-speaking world. Stamina is needed to brave the horrors of his uncannily contemporary vision, but, pleads the curator, "Don't forget the happiness of Goya!" By Claudia Schwartz.
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How to empty the room in one minute

Monday 18 July, 2005

Sony has already packed its bags and left Berlin but the music scene is unconcerned. Electronic music in the German capital is in the hands of a lively network of small labels, experimental, alive and kicking. By Oliver Ilan Schulz
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The big lie

Monday 18 July, 2005

Sociologist Ulrich Beck explains why German politicians' idea of full employment is an illusion and why Kafka's works belong to the classics of sociology.
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German Elections Special

The results of the federal elections have left Germany in something of a political muddle. After both mainstream parties (SPD and CDU) declared themselves victor, the coalition negotiations began. By October 18, a new chancellor has to have been named. We've put together a dossier of relevant articles on the elections and their aftermath: Arno Widmann writes that Chancellor Gerhard Schröder has dropped his media mask, Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht describes the penchant for paradox hanging over the entire election, Jörg Lau runs over the spectrum of protagonists. Eva Menasse and Tanja Dückers debate the role writers should take in the election campaign...
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German coverage of the London bombings

Friday 8 July, 2005

A small dossier on yesterday's terrorist attacks in London from the German point of view.
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What do the conservatives want?

Thursday 7 July, 2005

If Germany's conservatives win the coming elections in September they'll be more powerful than ever before. But what do they actually want? By Gustav Seibt
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Who are Germany's new young conservatives?

Tuesday 5 July, 2005

Now that Gerhard Schröder has admitted failure to himself and the rest of the world, German conservatives are being summoned back from political Siberia and pushed into the spotlight. But are they even still alive? By Mariam Lau
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