72nd International Short Film Festival Oberhausen, 28 April – 3 May 2026
based on true events?
The big Theme programme of the 72nd International Short Film Festival Oberhausen
With “based on true events?”, the 2026 Oberhausen Festival is dedicating its big Theme programme to exploring the relationship between reality and fiction in (documentary) film. The fact that images can lie is nothing new: propaganda is inextricably linked to the history of film itself. With AI-generated fakes, this development is currently taking on a new dimension. From the dawn of film history to today’s generative AI-created images, Oberhausen explores the relationship between reality, fiction and speculation in film. Eight programmes focus on moments in film history that shed light on concepts of truth and how they are addressed in film. From early cinema films in the Mitchell & Kenyon collection, through Werner Herzog’s concept of ‘ecstatic truth’, the programme extends to a selection of films curated by Clemens von Wedemeyer on the origins and effects of ‘artificial intelligence’ in image production. Two further programmes address specific aspects of the construction of reality in film within the context of power and gender politics: who constructs the prevailing reality, which realities remain hidden, and how are they made visible? The film programmes are complemented by a panel discussion entitled: “Apocalypse AI? Based on true events.”
The Programmes
The Mitchell & Kenyon Films and the Truth
When it was rediscovered in the mid-1990s, the Mitchell & Kenyon collection caused a sensation: around 900 reels of film from 1899 to 1912, produced by the photographers James Mitchell and Sagar Kenyon for their company, Norden Film. They depict groups of people in the industrial areas of northern England and were made for the screening contexts of the time: as travelling attractions for fairs, town halls, theatres and similar venues. Film was new and a sensation: those being filmed wanted to see themselves on the screen and made eye contact with the new camera without hesitation.
Today these reels are regarded as invaluable, authentic documents of their time, yet even back then the scenes were staged: the filmmakers directed the crowd, placed conspicuously dressed men, women and children in the foreground, got them to wave, or occasionally even tried to provoke a scuffle. What we perceive today as an authentic image of that era was, even then, a matter of the conquest of reality. Curated by Bryony Dixon, British Film Institute.
2 May, 8.15 pm
Paradoxical Truths: The Films of Werner Herzog
Werner Herzog ranks among the greats of auteur cinema, also as a documentary filmmaker. In an age of fakes and false truths, the concept of ‘ecstatic truth’ – a term he coined – is seeing a remarkable resurgence. Oberhausen presents a selection of his early short films, which since the 1960s were often screened first in Oberhausen and then worldwide, and in which Herzog’s method of truth – his controversial yet popular blend of documentary and fiction – is particularly evident. In outspoken contrast to the supposed naturalism of Direct Cinema, Herzog sees himself as a storyteller rooted in real life. His truth is deliberately subjective. It must be brought to light through his cinematic method, and comes to the fore above all through his play with the tools of cinematic fiction – a fact that is particularly evident in his early short films.
In two programmes, Oberhausen presents short films by and featuring Werner Herzog from 1968 to 1980, ranging from Letzte Worte (Last Words, 1968) to Werner Herzog Eats His Shoe (1980) by Les Blank, including the legendary Maßnahmen gegen Fanatiker (Precautions against Fanatics, 1969) and Die große Ekstase des Bildschnitzers Steiner (The Great Ecstasy of Woodcarver Steiner, 1974). Curated by the Kurzfilmtage programming team.
30 April, 10 pm
2 May, 3 pm
Training the Image
In three programmes curated by Clemens von Wedemeyer, Oberhausen presents current works: productions created using AI, as well as those that critically examine the impact of generative image production on society and the environment. Are AI films still part of cinema, or have they already become a different medium that incorporates film history merely as training data? Is the question ‘Is an image true?’ now being replaced by the question ‘What processes produced this image?’
“Division of Labour” examines the impact of AI on the global world of work, including in Their Eyes by Nicolas Gourault, which explores the experiences of online workers from the Global South who teach self-driving cars to navigate the streets of the Global North. “Raw Processes” examines the material foundations of digital systems – extraction, environmental destruction and industrialisation. As early as 2014, in All That Is Solid, Louis Henderson used digital means to explore the connection between the digital revolution and new forms of colonialism in the exploitation of people and the environment. Finally, “Forensics of the Unreal” shows how generative images push the boundaries of reality, hallucinate, become ‘weird’ and ‘uncanny’ – and how filmmakers deal with these boundaries. In Love Your Nails!, for example, Oberhausen award-winner Narges Kalhor subverts gender roles using artificial, AI-generated fingernails: AI as a means of turning the social codes of supposed truths on their head.
29 April, 8.15 pm
30 April, 5 pm
1 May, 11 am
Playing out speculativities: “Truth or Dare” and “Hide and Seek”
Truth or Dare
This programme explores speculative practices through which realities are tested in cinema: performance, re-enactment, archival intervention, science fiction, or narrative experiments. Reality is understood here as something that is constructed; a mechanism that is also exploited now by reactionary actors for their own ends. But who possesses the resources, and whose projections solidify into infrastructure? The films in this programme explore the potential of speculation and alternative worlds through the lens of gender identities, from Kenneth Anger’s Fireworks (1947) to Philipp Gufler’s The Beginning of Identification, and Its End (2024). Curated by Michel Wagenschütz.
1 May, 8.15 pm
Hide and Seek
In dialogue with “Truth or Dare”, this programme demonstrates how cinematic role-playing can bring hidden truths and overlooked stories to the fore, challenging normative historiography and its claim to truth. It opens with Tomás Paula Marques’ Cabra Cega (Blindman’s Buff), which, against a backdrop of rising fascism and homophobia and transphobia, conjures up queer spirits from the past in a cinematic gesture. Htet Aung Lywn’s JuJu vs The Possibilities of Love, Life & Death also explores cinematic ghosts, reimagining the history of cinema from a queer and migrant perspective. Curated by Sarnt Utamachote.
3 May, 3.15 pm
Panel discussion: AI Apocalypse? Based on true events.
Trained to fulfil prompts and seamlessly imitate external reality, image-generating AIs challenge our perception of the real. What tools can we find in the history of film and art when it comes to distinguishing reality from illusion? Might these tools help us to come closer to the concept of a self-critical AI aesthetic? And in doing so, to take into account the effects of the AI industry on society and the environment?
With Prof. Clemens von Wedemeyer, Professor of Expanded Cinema, Academy of Visual Arts, Leipzig; Ariana Dongus, critical media scholar, Berlin; Prof. Dr Jan Distelmeyer, Professor of Media History and Media Theory, Potsdam University of Applied Sciences and University of Potsdam; Dr Inke Arns, Director of the HMKV Hartware MedienKunstVerein, Dortmund.
30 April, 10 am
Stills from selected films are available on request at the Oberhausen press office or for download here.
Accreditation for the 72nd festival here.
Accreditation deadline: 24 April 2026
Oberhausen, 15 April 2026
Press contact: Sabine Niewalda, T +49 (0)208 825-3073, niewalda@kurzfilmtage.de