John Ford (1894–1973) is doubtlessly one of the outstanding personalities in the history of cinema, a masterly image stylist and virtuoso storyteller. The scope of his oeuvre – he shot more than 140 films in 60 years (of which many early ones are lost, however) – is imposing, his contribution to the development of cinematography evident, and his influence on following generations of filmmakers undeniable. Ford’s films possess great aesthetic-stylistic beauty and diversity, ranging from the expressionistic-gloomy works of the late 1920s and early 30s, in which one senses the influence of F.W. Murnau (e.g., THE INFORMER, 1935), all the way to his late, strongly reduced and straightforward westerns (e.g., THE SEARCHERS, 1956). A similarly wide range is offered by the number of different genres in which John Ford's movies are set. In addition to westerns, for which he is still most famous (although he shot only one western between 1926 and 1945 –STAGECOACH, 1939), he directed numerous war and adventure movies (THE PRISONER OF SHARK ISLAND, 1936), social dramas (THE GRAPES OF WRATH, 1940, and HOW GREEN WAS MY VALLEY, 1941), as well as comedies set in the Confederate states (THE SUN SHINES BRIGHT, 1952). Born as the last of 13 children of an Irish immigration family in Maine (USA), John Ford deals in many of his films with the pivotal moments of American history, its mythical dimensions and legends. Frequent themes include the appropriation of land, the violent reclaiming of land in the American West, the Civil War, or the founding of the nation. In Ford’s films, the world is in a state of change and reorientation, his protagonists are searching for community, a homeland and identity. Ford’s heroes are usually lonely persons, outsiders, loners, who mainly in the West, against the backdrop of a seemingly boundless nature and an overpowering landscape (expansive steppes or the claustrophobic Monument Valley), establish a community, but often fail to find one themselves. A special kind of community is what Ford developed behind the camera, repeatedly working with the same crew members and actors. The latter, including Harry Carey, Will Rogers, John Wayne, Henry Fonda or James Stewart, epitomized Ford’s torn heroes, and they often not only began their career working with Ford but also played their best roles in his movies.

THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA (Julian Rupert, USA 1925) features Lon Chaney, "The Man of a Thousand Faces" as the masked and facially deformed Phantom who haunts the Paris Opera House, causing murder and mayhem in an attempt to force the management to make the woman he loves a star. As always silent movie expert Vaginal Davis is hosting the evening. At the piano: Eunice Martins. (24.4.)

One can observe for quite some time now that the close historical ties between the dispositif of "cinema" and the aesthetic practice of "film" have been expanded by a number of other media configurations. Between YouTube and art space, HBO and multiplex: Where can cinema (still and again) be found today, what is (still) film? These are the main questions posed by a conference organized by Volker Pantenburg and Simon Rothöhler (SFB 626 / FU Berlin) which will be opened at Arsenal with contributions by the artist and theorist Victor Burgin ("Log Line and Monologue") and the film critic Jonathan Rosenbaum ("Goodbye Cinema, hello Cinephilia"). On the following two days, lectures will be given at the ICI Kulturlabor by, among others, Raymond Bellour, Diedrich Diederichsen, Tom Gunning, Miriam Hansen, Vinzenz Hediger, Ute Holl, Gertrud Koch, and Lev Manovich. (April 22)

LIVERPOOL (Lisandro Alonso, Argentina / F / D / NL / E 2008): After 20 years at sea, Farell returns to his rough homeland, Tierra del Fuego, to see his mother again. His return is slow and hesitant. When arriving at the place of his childhood, he is not met by a joyful welcome but by a surprising encounter: The family has a new member.

DAY OF THE SPARROW (Philip Scheffner, D 2010) is a political nature film in which the border between war and peace is dissolved. On November 14, 2005, a sparrow is shot after having toppled 23,000 dominos in the Dutch town of Leeuwarden. In Kabul, a German soldier is killed in a suicide attack. The juxtaposition of these headlines prompted the director to search for war using the methods of ornithology. In Germany, not Afghanistan. For this is where the question arises: Are we living in peace or are we at war?

KRATZIG 1 – 3 and SCRATCH (2010, April 25) are the titles of four films on 16 mm, 35 mm and DVD that schoolchildren of the Hunsrück-Grundschule and the Evangelische Schule Berlin Zentrum produced in three workshops by means of manual scratching, painting, anima-tion and sound. We are delighted to present the films in the presence of the young filmmakers and the workshop and project heads, Ute Aurand, Robert Beavers, Dirk Schaefer, and Stefanie Schlüter, at Arsenal. All workshops were supported by funds of the Berliner Projektfonds Kulturelle Bildung.

Since entering the market, the Volkswagen production plant in Wolfsburg has continuously made an effort to bring moving images of the production process in its factory halls to the movie theaters. This program presents a selection of corporate films that were commissioned by Volkswagen during the years of the economic miracle in Germany and that focus on the production of the automobile sold throughout the world. The time-related cross-section allows drawing exciting comparisons: What filmic motifs were at the fore immediately after the end of the war, once car-making was resumed? How did the content and shape of the cinematic images of series production change during the course of the "long 1950s"?

The DEFA-Stiftung starts its monthly film series with the following double program: In her documentary VERDAMMT, ICH BIN ERWACHSEN – DER DEFA-REGISSEUR ROLF LOSANSKY (D 2009, premiere, April 12, as guests: Dagmar Seume, Rolf Losansky), director Dagmar Seume portrays the successful DEFA director of children's and youth's films, Rolf Losansky. From 1963 on, he shot more than 20 films for children and youths that today count as classics. In encounters with fellow travelers and in the confrontation with his films and archival material, the film retraces decisive biographical, theoretical and historical moments.

In April we invite visitors of the Magical History Tour to lend an ear. At issue in this month's – as always subjective – selection is less the big topic of sound (which we will deal with in the future) but three pivotal and oftentimes neglected elements of the audio track: the voice, language and speaking in film. The audible voice in conjunction with the image of the actor in film counted as one of the fundamental innovations of sound film and in some cases soon became an existential problem. Many voices failed to meet the audience's expectations: For example, the British accent of English actors was met by laughter in the United States, the rough voice of Greta Garbo at first alienated the spectators, and the twang of John Gilbert was completely rejected. These early responses by the audience already refer to the high status that the voice (and, derived from it, language and speaking) has in relation to the image in film. But not only the acoustic features, the tone of the actors’ voices and their alleged "harmonious" unity with the cinematic image refer to the power of the voice in cinema, but also such moments in which voices and language resist the images, in which both elements diverge and becomes detached from each other. In many of the films presented this month, the formal tensional relationship becomes a basic module and the starting point of the plot.

Unusual, surprising, amusing, and pensive insights into Jewish life around the world is what the 23 films of the 16th Jewish Film Festival promise. The festival will take place from the end of April to the beginning of May in Berlin and Potsdam, again under the reliable direction of Nicola Galliner.