The cinema as an institution is in crisis, while the number of film festivals continues to rise. The discussion will focus on the question of whether this results in new responsibilities for film festivals. Should they pay screening fees instead of providing prize money and awards? How do film festivals respond to the Internet? Are they becoming a new contemporary film museum?

Art today finds itself subject to efforts to utilize artistic production for the pedagogical aims of 'cultural education'. But what do the artists themselves think of this endeavour? Can the present paradigms of cultural production and education be maintained in the face of demographic developments in Europe?

Guests: Carl Hegemann, dramaturg (Berlin); Ruth Noack, curator (Vienna); Mark Terkessidis, author (Berlin/Cologne)

Moderator: Arzu Toker, author (Cologne)

As part of the film programme Whose History?
History does not exist: there are only histories of...: of war, the twentieth century, art... How and why do we record? Should history be rethought in the context of artists' film and video? While considering this particular history, its abstract and some parallel practices (performance art) we examine some alternatives to its generic link with art history.

As part of the film programme Border-Crossers and Trouble-Makers
How has the role of the oppositional experimental filmmaker changed? What interventionist techniques, approaches, strategies and structures become most useful to oppositional practice in film? In other words, how can filmmakers most effectively resist such a starkly totalized reshaping of the political as we experience today?

Are critical questions as to the content, direction and meaning of education and society losing their relevance? Is scholarship walling itself in behind specialized fields of knowledge? Representatives from various generations exchange viewpoints on critical thinking and writing.

Guests: Kerstin Grether, author (Berlin); Jörg Heiser, author (Berlin); Klaus Kreimeier, film historian (Berlin); Heide Schlüpmann, film theorist (Frankfurt/M.)

Moderator: Michael Girke, author (Herford)