Human Rights In Cinema Competition

CENTRAL AIRPORT THF

• Director: Karim Aïnouz
• GERMANY, FRANCE, BRAZIL  / 2018 / DCP / Colour / 97´ / Arabic, English, German, Russian; Turkish, English s.t.

• Director of Photography: Juan Sarmiento
• Editing: Felix von Boehm
• Music: Benedikt Schiefer
• Producer: Felix von Boehm
• Production Co.: Lupa Film
• World Sales: Luxbox 

- 2018 BERLIN Amnesty International Film Prize

Karim Aïnouz, the director of Futuro Beach and the Madame Satã, which competed at the Festival earlier, returns with an extraordinary documentary which premiered at the Berlinale in February. The film observes the refugee crisis in the middle of Europe, at the defunct Tempelhof airport in Berlin. Built by the Nazis, the gigantic hangars of Tempelhof now host immigrants who flee the war. Central Airport THF focuses on an 18-year-old Syrian and a 35-year-old Iraqi man. Aïnouz criticises the “hysterical coverage of the refugees in the media. These are human beings, you know?” the filmmaker stresses, “I was very lucky to have people who were generous enough to share their stories.”

This film was a Meetings on the Bridge participant.