ARTHOUSE CINEMA with BAR and BISTRO in the heart of NEUKÖLLN
The film series Transit – Stories of Travellers and Migrants explores the places where we were born and raised, as well as the places to which we have migrated and where we live today. We are filmmakers born in the former Soviet Union, Ethiopia, Palestine, and Israel, who eventually found ourselves in Germany, Israel, or elsewhere: some by choice, others not. Some of our migrations are geographical and external; others are political, emotional, and internal. Some of the countries we come from no longer exist, while others are struggling for their future and self-definition.
Driven by a desire to understand the particular perspective of migrants, we journey into our own pasts while taking a critical look at the present. In this film series, we bring our films and ourselves together and enter into dialogue with one another – even when, or precisely because, our narratives contradict each other, even when one person's arrival marks the beginning of another's uprooting.
Masel Tov Cocktail – 30 min
German with English subtitles
Migrant? Russian? Jewish? All of the above. That's Dima. And Dima lives in Germany, out of all places. He didn't choose any of this. But then he happens to break a classmate's nose… Dima is the protagonist of "Masel Tov Cocktail", a 30-minute fiction film that approaches the subject of being Jewish in Germany in a highly entertaining and (self-)ironic way.
Super Women – 80 min
Russian and Hebrew with English subtitles
The protagonists of "Super Women" are migrant, Russian, and Jewish too: this documentary follows five women working at the checkout of a supermarket in Tel Aviv, recounting their personal stories against the backdrop of life in Israel during the 2000s.
The collapse of the Soviet Union and rising antisemitism prompted many Jews to leave their homelands during the 1980s and 1990s. Being Jewish was recorded in Soviet passports – visible to all – even though most Jews in the Soviet Union lived secular lives. More than 200,000 people came to Germany as Jewish quota refugees, while over 800,000 moved to Israel. Both migration movements were politically orchestrated. Germany understood this as an act of reparation for the Shoah; Israel justified it by invoking the historical homeland. Yet officials and major media outlets in both countries failed to mention that many of those who arrived were highly educated academics whose degrees and social status were effectively reset to zero upon migration.
From 10:00 am – Doors open
11:00 am – "Masel Tov Cocktail" (fiction film, 30 min.)
11:30 am – "Super Women" (documentary, 80 min.)
approx. 1:30 pm – Conversation in the foyer
Included with your ticket: a bruschetta or a sfogliata.
Yael Reuveny and Evgenia Gostrer (curators) with Arkadij Khaet (director, "Masel Tov Cocktail") and Dr. Dina Berdichevsky (literary scholar)
The film series takes place in cooperation with the Institut für Neue Soziale Plastik. The Institut für Neue Soziale Plastik is a collective of Jewish and antisemitism-critical directors, dramaturgs, authors, and artists. Since its founding in 2015, it has developed artistic projects from a Jewish perspective on Jewish life and history, memory culture, and antisemitism. A further focus of its work is advising cultural institutions, independent groups, curators, and artists on questions of antisemitism.
https://neue-soziale-plastik.de/en/
Young writer Nate moves to Berlin and meets Wena, a mysterious girl who brings him flowers every day. They soon fall in love, but there’s one thing in the way — Lovis, Wena’s troubled childhood friend, returning from his stay at the psychiatric ward. The three form an unlikely bond, but as Nate and Wena’s romance fades, they discover that loving Lovis is the only thing they still have in common.
The Shorts Show is the event the Berlin film scene was missing: a real cinema night, but not for Hollywood blockbusters; for SHORTS! Started in 2026, our curated monthly screenings have been enthusiastically received by the local community of filmmakers and moviegoers.
We welcome films of all genres and filmmakers of all levels of experience. A big name or budget won’t help you here; we simply choose the best. We have hosted award-winning directors, and directors who were with us watching their film on the silver screen for the very first time.
The Shorts Show has become more than just a film festival screening; one evening of the month, it’s where all Berlin film lovers come to digest the best the short form has to offer. Your film will be enjoyed and dissected frame by frame by people obsessed with the art of cinema.
