In November, the European Union National Institutes for Culture in Berlin (EUNIC Berlin) continue their comprehensive film series, showing European films that have won the Golden Bear at the Berlin International Film Festival over the last six decades. This illuminating trip into the history of the Berlinale comprises 20 feature-length and short films from a wide range of different genres and spans a huge wealth of different artistic signatures.

On November 25, Rosa von Praunheim turns 70! We are celebrating his birthday with a brunch in the dffb canteen on the 9th floor of the Filmhaus at 12pm (Price 10 €, please register at 030-269 55 100) and a lengthy day of films taking in six features and many different guests. Rosa von Praunheim was born in Riga in 1942, grew up in Berlin and the Frankfurt district of Praunheim and has to this day shot more than 70 films. He is a passionate filmmaker whose films are characterized by an irrepressible lust for excess, transgression, sensuality and the opulence of life. He remains unconcerned with aesthetic convention or so-called "good" taste, is loud and shrill, but always shows a totally serious interest in the people in his portraits.

"Specters of Freedom: Cinema and Decolonialization" establishes relationships between the Arsenal film archive and two archives in Mozambique and Guinea-Bissau which relate an important chapter in the story of anti-colonial African cinema. As part of his "Living Archive" project, curator Tobias Hering has invited Portuguese artists Catarina Simão and Filipa César to present their respective, not explicitly related research on each of these archives at the Arsenal cinema. Over a total of five evenings, films of different origins, visual fragments and sound recordings create a resonance chamber which serves to bring up both the role of cinema in the decolonialisation processes of the 70s and the politics of archives for discussion. The timeframe of the film selection is the 70s. The program also includes a video installation by Catarina Simão in the Black Box in the Arsenal foyer (5.11.-12.11. and 26.11.-28.11., 4pm–10pm, projection restarts on the hour). On 27 und 28.11., filmmaker Sana na N'Hada from Guinea-Bissau will also be in attendance.

This month, Ms. Davis presents the Indian classic PYAASA (1957) by Guru Dutt, who died of an overdose of sleeping pills at the age of 39. Dutt's work attempted to use commercial Bollywood cinema as a sounding board for socially critical content and challenge its aesthetic at the same time. The film centers on a failed poet who doesn't even receive recognition within his own family. After he's declared dead due to a mix-up however, his work suddenly becomes a posthumous success, while he is taken to an insane asylum in another mix-up. Followed by drinks and music in Arsenal 2. (11.11.)

The production designer is the "director's eye" according to famous PD Ken Adam. The production design team implements the script in visual terms, conceptualizes and orchestrates spaces, defines milieus, establishes color schemes for dramatic purposes and plays a central role in creating the atmosphere and fictional world of a film. Beyond such design-intensive genres as science fiction or the history film, convincing production design is also a central factor in productions less obviously concerned with scenery, the essential contribution it makes to the "art" of film being often overlooked despite it being literally impossible to miss.

arsenal distribution will be releasing another film from this year's Forum program: TEPENIN ARDI (BEYOND THE HILL) by Emin Alper. Following the release on November 15, the winner of this year’s Caligari Film Prize is touring selected cinemas with its director in attendance from November 16 - 19.