Films:

Loin du 16ème | Far from the 16th– Daniela Thomas (France, 2006, 5 min.)
Calea Dunării | The Course of the Danube – Sabin Dorohoi (Romania, 2013, 13 min.)
媽媽離家上班去 | Homecoming (Hong Kong, 2009, 30 min.)
Hasta Bakıcı | Abigail – Soner Sert (Turkey, 2017, 17 min.)
Kot Farkı | Ground Level – Ayris Alptekin (Turkey, 2016, 11 min.)

The short film program focuses on the living and working conditions of immigrant workers in very different countries, discussing the difficult circumstances of women who seek to gain a future for their children left behind. Loin du 16ème / Far from the 16th shows a Spanish immigrant in Paris who gives her own baby to a daycare early in the morning to look after the baby of a rich family in her job. A ten-year-old boy follows the Calea Dunării / The Course of the Danube from Romania to Vienna to find his parents. The nanny Charlie, after years of work in Hong Kong, is preparing for the long-awaited Homecoming to her son, but suddenly unexpected problems arise. Hasta Bakıcı / Abigail and Kot Farkı / Ground Level address the everyday work of care-givers in Istanbul.

Nobody shall know about the death of their grandmother. In order to escape the state’s care, the 17-year-old Raya and her little brother bury the woman they grew up with in the garden of the local apple orchard. Raya alone organizes the daily survival for herself and her brother and puts all hope in the mother who emigrated to England.

Renārs Vimba enrolled in the Latvian Academy of Culture in 2008, where he studied cinematography; later he went to study under Boris Frumin at the Baltic Film and Media School in Tallinn; in 2011, he received an MA in Film Direction from the Academy of Culture. His film Mellow Mud has received the Latvian National Film Award Lielais Kristaps for Best Fiction Film. Vimba is currently working on his second feature, Sanctus.

Georgiana will soon turn 15 and is taking care of her six younger siblings. The seven children are living together in Romania while their mother works in Italy. The oldest sister cooks, cleans and on the side tries to find time for studying. In August their mother shall return.

Nadja has worked for many years as a housekeeper for a wealthy family of the Greek upper class. With her work she finances the education and the social advancement of her own daughter. She is allowed to feel like a part of the family. When Nadja is diagnosed with a serious illness and the employer is facing financial difficulties in the wake of the economic crisis, the situation begins to collapse.

Athanasios Karanikolas studied photography at the New School for Social Research and at Parsons School of Design in New York. He then studied video and media art at the Art Academy in Düsseldorf, as well as film direction at the University of Film and Television “Konrad Wolf” in Potsdam. In 2007, he made his first feature-length film Elli Makra, 42277 Wuppertal. Alongside his work as a filmmaker, Karanikolas also teaches at various universities as well as directing for the theatre.

The 88-year-old Anne spends her life in Bochum stuck on the sofa. Recently, her husband has died. He had skilfully provided everything for her daily life, which means one thing is now terribly clear for the daughters: Anne can not live alone. Over in the Polish Lubin, Jowita's family has been living for years in the construction site of their house. Lacking money, Jowita desperately needs work. These two families appear to coincidentally bring about a seemingly perfect win-win situation. FAMILY BUSINESS juxtaposes these two families. Without simple attributions, the film follows the trail of economics that invades deep into the everyday lives of these families.