Status: 21.08.2025 4:14 p.m.
The drama “look in the sun” by director Mascha Schilinski is said to go into the race for the Oscars for Germany. He was selected by German Films as a German contribution and prevailed against four other applicants.
The film takes place on a farm in the Altmark, four women live there – in 1910, 1940, 1980 in the GDR and today. It begins with the young Alma (greatly played by the Hamburg newcomer Hanna), who grown up in the 1910s as the daughter of the landlords, firmly rooted in tradition, religion and a certain superstition, to Nelly, who moved from the big city to the house with her family in the 2020s.
Portrait of German history
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The Lübeck Filip Schnack – here at the premiere in Cannes – plays in the film Alma’s older brother Fritz.
The Berliner Schilinski tells of domestic violence, repressed longings or inherited trauma who experience the four women. The director had won the jury’s prize at the film festival in Cannes. Artistically, sometimes ghostly, Schilinski stages the four ways of life, tells of branched emotional life that seem to be continued over generations – and in a house.
It does not follow any chronology, but lets life blurred and opens up a sensual, mediative-associative experience. As on the way, she portrays a good century of German history, gives insights through key holes and door columns that should actually remain closed to her protagonist.
Schilinski: “Great love for the story letter”
It is only the second feature film Schilinski, which was interested in the story of the story early on, but rather by chance ended up with the medium of the moving image. At the film school in Hamburg, a place that she also recorded without a high school diploma, she completed a script master class, then developed as an author of formats and content that did not develop her own goods. Series, Telenovelas, the longing for her own projects was great, at 28 she studied the film academy in Ludwigsburg.
The 41-year-old does not want to describe herself as a classic cineast: “I am not a person who watches a film every day and who has already watched so many films.” But there is “a great love for storytelling, there is a great love for visual and haptic”.
Fatih Akins “Amrum” could not prevail
“Look in the sun” prevailed against Fatih Akins “Amrum”. The film adaptation of the childhood memories Hark Bohms, Akin’s long -standing friend and teacher, celebrated world premiere in Cannes this year. It will be performed for the first time in Germany at the Hamburg Film Festival before it comes to the cinema nationwide on October 9th.
Also in the pre -selection, the documentary “Riefenstahl” produced by Sandra Maischberger were directed by Andres Veiel -an NDR co -production -as well as “Cranko” by Joachim Lang with Sam Riley and the anti -war film “Tiger” by Dennis Gansel, an in -house production of the streaming provider Amazon.
Shortlist on December 16
The choice of German contribution is only one of several preliminary stages. The shortlist for the category of the best international film will be announced on December 16. The five nominated films are selected from this shortlist and announced on January 22, 2026. The 98th Oscar Awards will take place on Sunday, March 15, 2026 (local time, CET on Monday night).
Last year, the film “The Saat of the Holy Fig tree” of the Iranian Mohammad Rasoulof was selected in Hamburg was selected as a German Oscar contribution and later also nominated as one of five candidates for the best international film. He went away empty-handed at this year’s Oscar award.
