In the Westfalen Connection section, the best film of the region will be chosen for the fifth time – this year for the first time in two competitions. As before for short films with a maximum length of 30 minutes and now also for longer contributions. Already at the last Filmfestival Münster, the Münster-based Stiftung Westfalen-Initiative doubled the prize money to €1,000. This time, it is offering an additional €1,500 in prize money for the longer film competition.

The Westfalen Connection’s short film competition will feature a colorful mix of the most diverse films, ranging from historical material such as Die Spökenkiekerin und das Fräulein vom Haus Kummerveldt-Team and Wild Wild Westfalen (in Low German!), to highly topical issues such as dealing with artificial intelligence in The Miro Project or the question of when sexual harassment begins in text me when you get home xx. The two short film programs will be screened on Saturday, September 30.

Three long feature films are invited to the new Westfalen Connection competition, which in turn also impress with a remarkable range of artistic expression and thematic diversity – from the musical Living Your Life, a graduation film from Dortmund University of Applied Sciences and Arts that bows to classic Hollywood musicals, to the free-flowing form play Seascape, in which conventional narratives dissolve and something new emerges.

The Westfalen Connection film selection shows the enormous creative potential that exists in the region and how films worth seeing can be made even with mostly limited financial resources. In order to increase the visibility of regional filmmaking, we have not only expanded this section, but also launched a network day that brings filmmakers together and hopefully results in new synergies.

  • Haus Kummerveldt
    The complete series in the cinema mix – or how the aristocratic Luise cured hysteria by screaming until her corset burst from her waist into the Fatherland’s face.
  • Tomorrow Somewhere by the Sea
    A road trip after high school graduation is the setting of this independent feature film based on the popular novel by Adriana Popescu, in which four fundamentally different teenagers set off together to Portugal to find themselves, their own lives and the great freedom after school.
  • Living Your Life
    The feel-good musical with earworm potential tells the story of two strong, independent and very different women whose fates are woven together in a miraculous way.
  • Seascape
    The first feature-length film by the Münster-based artist group “Kollektiv des guten Willens” is an ambiguous conundrum about a film shoot that brushes the usual relationships between director, crew and audience against the grain.
  • Total Thrash – The Teutonic Story – Extended
    The documentary Total Thrash – The Teutonic Story dives into the social and cultural world of the scene genre “Thrash Metal” especially in Germany in relation to bands, promoters and fans and offers the viewer a journey through time in a total of three chapters up to the present day. And additionally for the first time on the big screen: The Big Teutonic 4 – stories about Sodom, Kreator, Tankard and Destruction.
  • Westfalen Connection Short Film Programme 1
    The Miro Project (D 2022) HH Blue Light (D 2023) A Lady’s Rituals (D 2023) Concrete Rose (D 2022) Lucia – Everything Rosy on the Pony Farm? (D 2023) Die Verlorenen (D 2022)
  • Westfalen Connection Short Film Programme 2
    Wild Wild Westfalen (D 2023) I May Always Ask Her Anything (D 2022) In Between (D 2022) Duo (D 2022) Os·mo·sis (D 2022) text me when you get home xx (D 2022)