Christoph Merkele

A small town in Western Germany is the last stop for 26,000 pigs per day and a brief home for masses of Eastern European temporary workers. The workers of the largest slaughterhouse in the country are fighting for survival, while German activists who stand up for their rights are fighting against the local authorities. At the same time, Munich high school students are working on the play "Saint Joan of the Stockyards" and trying to grasp the old text and German capitalism of our days. Interwoven with the young people's examination of the text in the rehearsals, the film deals in various fragments with conditions and facets of temporary work and labour migration in Germany.

Vienna, 1937, on the eve of the annexation of Austria into Nazi Germany. The young and inexperienced Franz Huchel begins to learn about both the joys and hardships of life by working as an apprentice to the mutilated war veteran Otto Trsnjek in a small tobacco shop, where he meets the famous psychiatrist Sigmund Freud, a regular customer, who will become a valuable friend in times of chaos and uncertainty.

Mina’s family has introduced her to few potential husbands in Iran. She has rejected them all until she meets Kian, a surgeon who has travelled from Germany in search of a wife.

Province policeman Franz Eberhofer is in a real trouble. Susi, love of his life has fled to Italy because Franz has crossed the line. And while Grandma and Papa are planning a trip to Italy to liberate Susi from the clutches of her Italian lover, Franz has other problems. His boss has found a bloody pig head in his bed and Franz gets promoted to full time bodyguard.

The deep friendship between young theater actresses Maria and her Jewish friend Lea gradually starts to break as Marias husband Hans goes from being a young adventurer to a high ranking SS officer. But on that day of the Jewish deportations in Munich, Maria comes to a momentous decision which proves what friendship really means to her. She takes on Leas child Charlotte to save her from being deported to the concentration camp, thereby risking her own life and ultimately loosing Hans. Marias story shows that in the end friendship can triumph over terror and death. The film is inspired by the childhood of Charlotte Knobloch, Vice President of the World Jewish Congress and supports our project.

A policeman suspects that several bizarre deaths in the same family were murders and that the killer is a mysterious woman who just moved to the village.

Joseph Vilsmaier documentary BAVARIA - dream journey through Bavaria is the first major documentary film about Germany's most beautiful open country. At the same time it is a journey through the history of the region, its traditions, customs and traditions.