School screening and discussion with the Holocaust survivor Zoni Weisz
Date: 06 / 12 / 2019 I 9:00 – 10:30
Place: Moviemento, Kottbusser Damm 22, 10967 Berlin
Free entrance
Registration required: viktoria.hofer@romatrial.org
In German language
As part of the AKE DIKHEA? Festival of Romani Film a film screening for school classes on the theme “Sinti and Roma during the Second World War” will take place, followed by a discussion with the Holocaust survivor Zoni Weisz and the director of MOUSIE, David Bartlett.
FILMS:
MEMORY BOXES
Hamze Bytyçi
Germany, 2019
8′
Zoni Weisz hid his memories as though they were behind locked cabinet doors. Behind some doors there are beautiful moments, behind others only agony and grief. They range from a childhood in a wagon to the deportation of his family to Auschwitz to doubts about his own identity. Over the years, Zoni learned how to deal with these memories. The animated short film shows a process that was painful but inevitable.
… THEY ONLY TAKE AWAY THE CRIMINALS
Hamze Bytyçi
Germany, 2019
7′
“They only take away the criminals,” Zilli Reichmann’s father said when the National Socialists arrested the first Sinti and Roma. Because he was fatally wrong, the 95-year-old Sintizza tells her story today. In the animated short film she tells of the murder of her daughter and family in the gas chambers of Auschwitz, her struggle for survival and the meaning of life after the Holocaust.
MOUSIE 
David Bartlett
United Kingdom, 2019
17‘
Berlin 1936. Hitler will soon host the Olympics, and the streets are being “cleansed” of Jews and Roma – “Gypsies”. Inside a dying Kabarett club, seven-year-old Romni Helene hides in a wardrobe, concealed by tap-dancer Katharina who plans to escape the poison of Nazism and take Helene to America – where everyone is welcome, no matter the colour of their skin. But Helene won’t rest. Sneaking about unseen, the little mouse sees everything – a dancing devil, a nervous stage-manager, an alcoholic “new age Nazi” comedian. And the arrival of awkward Nazi conscript, Otto. Finding his feet as a newly-empowered thug, he clumsily makes a pass at Katharina, but greater jeopardy awaits as he discovers the little mouse. Only the child’s ingenuity and talent will save her now…
GUESTS
Zoni Weisz
… lost his parents and siblings during National Socialism. After the war he became one of the leading florists in Europe and worked among others for the Dutch royal family. In 2011 he was the first representative of the Sinti and Roma to address the German Bundestag on the occasion of the Day of Remembrance of the Victims of National Socialism.
David Bartlett began his career as a director at the BBC – his first drama work as director of landscape photography for Happy Birthday Shakespeare. His first film drama The Goodbye Plane was shortlisted for an Academy Award. Alongside hit American shows such as Locked Up Abroad, Dangerous Persuasions (his episode Highway to Hate winning a CSC Award for Best Cinematography) and Paranormal Witness for SyFy, David has directed the BBC’s prime-time Casualty and written and directed acclaimed dramatizations of The Great Train Robbery, The Assassination of JFK and The Hitler Diaries for the BBC. David also wrote and directed TV feature Trial of the Knights Templar for Channel Five and Granada International, and was recently lead writer and drama director on Race For The White House for CNN and Netflix.