A still from Too Far Away, which opens the German Film programme on Saturday. — Photos german-films.de

HÀ NỘI — The Goethe Institute Hanoi will hold an online film programme from August 28 to September 18 to help people feel relaxed during the coronavirus lockdown.

The programme is held annually by the Goethe Institute Hanoi and shows a wide range of contemporary German films, including comedies, thrillers and family films.

“The German online film programme is a cultural event for broader audiences in Việt Nam during the pandemic,” said the institute director Wilfried Eckstein.

“It is an opportunity for the whole family to come together, cherish the experience of story-telling and get a valuable topic to talk about. The German films have been respectfully selected for this purpose. They are meant as an invitation to jointly overcome the difficult times we are in.”

“We wish this festival to be a meaningful gift to the audience during these days. Of course, more films are to come – either online or hopefully soon again when cinemas can re-open.”

Four films including Zu Weit Weg (Too Far Away); Atlas (The Mover); Grusse aus Fukushima (Greetings from Fukushima) and Amelie Rennt (Mountain Miracle – An Unexpected Friendship) will be shown every Saturday.

Too Far Away will be shown at 8pm on the first Saturday. It is about the friendship between two young boys, a German who has to move with his family from a village to a big city, and a Syrian refugee.

The film is the first motion picture by director Sarah Winkenstette. It has been screened at the Norwegian International Film Festival 2020, the Espoo Ciné International Film Festival 2020 and the Seattle International Film Festival 2021.

It won the Teen Screen Award Molodist Kyiv 2019 and the Kids Jury Award Zurich 2019.

Drama and thriller, The Mover is about a 60-year-old removal man engaged in forced evictions, who recognises one of the tenants to be evicted is his estranged son. The film has been shown at festivals in Torino, Shanghai and Havana.

Audiences can watch the film on September 4.

Greetings from Fukushima, a drama about the aftermath of the Fukushima disaster, was a hit in cinemas in Germany as Japan marked the fifth anniversary of the tragedy. It tells the story of Marie, who travels to Fukushima shortly after the earthquake and tsunami to escape her broken dreams.

Greetings from Fukushima is about the aftermath of the Fukushima disaster.

The film was shot in the heart of Fukushima’s exclusion zone only months after the disaster. It picked up the Heiner Carow Award and the CICAE Art Cinema Award at the Berlinale International Film Festival, and best actress at the Bavarian Film Awards.

It will be shown on September 11.

Amelie Rennt is a children's film to be screened on September 18. Amelie suffers from asthma, runs away from a clinic and meets a boy who tells her about the miracle of the Alps Mountain Fires, which help cure the sick. The children take off on an adventurous journey of hope and friendship.

All the films have Vietnamese dubbing and German subtitles. Audiences can watch the films on the Goethe Institute Hanoi website. The films are free and available for a whole week after being released. — VNS