Marie’s love for cine­ma did not stop due to the Corona pan­de­mic: if she can’t go to the cine­ma, the cine­ma will come to her. Its atmo­sphe­re is irre­placeable for Marie. For her, howe­ver, it’s not the place that counts, but the qua­li­ty of the film – and in the best case, it makes her laugh. At LUCAS, she is curious about the dif­fe­rent per­spec­ti­ves of jury members.

Arthur plays the pia­no and the­r­e­fo­re pays par­ti­cu­lar atten­ti­on to the back­ground music in films. A visit to the cine­ma always means lots of sur­pri­ses for him – be it an exci­ting plot twist or a lar­ge group of applau­ding Eintracht fans who are also sit­ting in the cine­ma. Action films and come­dies are on the top of Arthur’s list, but he also looks for­ward to dis­co­ve­ring new gen­res at LUCAS.

Sophia has alre­a­dy gai­ned expe­ri­ence as a film edi­tor. That’s why she pays atten­ti­on to tiny details in films. When the lights go out in the cine­ma and her con­cen­tra­ti­on is com­ple­te­ly on the screen, she is grip­ped by a gre­at sen­se of anti­ci­pa­ti­on. Last year she missed this fee­ling extre­me­ly. She is the­r­e­fo­re more than plea­sed to be able to go to the cine­ma with the other jurors.

Christoph Mushayija Rath work­ed as a free­lan­ce pho­to­grapher and film­ma­ker in Senegal. In col­la­bo­ra­ti­on with CinéBanlieu Dakar, he shot seve­ral short films and docu­men­ta­ries. He then stu­di­ed direc­ting at the German Film and Television Academy Berlin (dffb). Rath is curr­ent­ly head wri­ter and direc­tor for a sit­com com­mis­sio­ned by ZDFneo.

Martina Lassacher is co-direc­­tor of the Vienna International Children’s Film Festival, direc­tor of the Pitanga Institute, KinderKinoWelten Austria and other pro­jects.  She taught film theo­ry at various Austrian uni­ver­si­ties and has been appoin­ted to num­e­rous inter­na­tio­nal juries.

Roman Klink stu­di­ed cul­tu­ral and media edu­ca­ti­on in Merseburg. Since 2001 he has­work­ed as a free­lan­ce film jour­na­list and in film public rela­ti­ons, deve­lo­ping his own fic­tion­al mate­ri­al. At ARD Degeto, Klink is invol­ved in inter­na­tio­nal fea­ture film purcha­sing and in pro­vi­ding edi-tori­al sup­port for cine­ma co-pro­­duc­­ti­ons. Since 2013 he has work­ed as a free­lan­ce aut­hor, edi­tor, dra­ma­tur­ge, and pro­ject scout.

In her child­hood Helena had alre­a­dy reco­gni­zed the art of film – thanks to her father. She still loves going to the cine­ma with him. According to Helena, the cru­cial fac­tor for a good film is the script, the sus­pen­se and the right actors and actres­ses. When the film is shown in its orig-inal ver­si­on, all her sen­ses are focu­sed on the film experience.

Augustin’s cir­cle of fri­ends loves films. Along with his fri­end Arthur, they like to exch­an­ge ide­as about sophisti­ca­ted films that have a well-thought-out plot and are not so easy to deci­pher. So it is logi­cal that Augustin is a big fan of film direc­tor Quentin Tarantino. He is alre­a­dy loo­king for­ward to exci­ting cine­ma days and lively dis­cus­sions with his jury colleagues.

Selma wri­tes sto­ries hers­elf and the­r­e­fo­re pays spe­cial atten­ti­on to the plot of a film. She is impres­sed by films that shi­ne with a gre­at sound­track or take a strong stand against inju­s­ti­ces and racism. She loves films like STAND BY ME (US 1986. Director: Rob Reiner) in the cine­ma becau­se of all their emo­tio­nal moments. As a juror, she wants to con­tri­bu­te to exci­ting discus-sions.

Boris Bakal is a theat­re and film direc­tor, actor, cura­tor, aut­hor, and edu­ca­tor. He has been a visi­ting pro­fes­sor at various inter­na­tio­nal uni­ver­si­ties and co-foun­­der of num­e­rous asso­cia-tions, inclu­ding Bacači Sjenki/Shadow Caster, an artists’ plat­form that has alre­a­dy recei­ved seve­ral awards for its work.

Charlotte Giese works as a Special Advisor at the Danish Film Institute in Copenhagen with a focus on film edu­ca­ti­on. Here she foun­ded the depart­ment for child­ren and young peo­p­le and deve­lo­ped nati­on­wi­de film edu­ca­ti­on pro­grams for schools. She also advi­ses film insti­tu­ti­ons in Africa and the Middle East on programming.

Gert Hermans is edi­­tor-in-chief of the ECFA Journal and has been part of num­e­rous juries of European fes­ti­vals. He has work­ed on seve­ral natio­nal and inter­na­tio­nal pro­jects to pro­mo­te chal­len­ging child­ren and youth films, col­la­bo­ra­ted with young film­ma­kers and tea­chers and has orga­ni­zed semi­nars and panels on film pro­duc­tion for JEF Film Festival.

Cinema is a source for crea­ti­ve inspi­ra­ti­on for Lilia. Her poems and pain­tings are influen­ced by films such as ATONEMENT (GB 2007. D: Joe Wright) and PORTRAIT DE LA JEUNE FILLE EN FEU (FR 2019. D: Celine Sciamma). Films that deal with women’s rights and address the LGBTQ com­mu­ni­ty have signi­fi­cant­ly shaped her identity.

For Kyrill, it is cru­cial that a film has a good inter­play of music and images to lea­ve a las­ting impres­si­on. If the dia­lo­gue and the key sce­nes of the film are also per­fect, the 16-year-old’s qua­li­ty cri­te­ria are com­ple­te­ly ful­fil­led. He is par­ti­cu­lar­ly fond of the films of Christopher Nolan.

From Carolina’s point of view, a film may not chan­ge the world, but it can at least chan­ge the life of a sin­gle per­son. AMERICAN BEAUTY (US 1999. D: Sam Mendes) is one such film that tur­ned her life upsi­de down. According to her, good films open people’s eyes, make them laugh and cry, show respect, love, and happiness.

Corona can also do some good: Juniper spent her time in lock­down wat­ching many films that are more than pure enter­tain­ment. They can chall­enge, like Juniper’s favo­ri­te film MELAN-CHOLIA (DK/SE/FR/D 2011. D: Lars von Trier) or show her new per­spec­ti­ves. In any case, it is important for her to reflect on her own life in what she sees.

Films can chan­ge the way we look at the world. For exam­p­le, they moti­va­te Kaloyan not to sim­ply igno­re cli­ma­te chan­ge, but to do some­thing about glo­bal warm­ing. Kaloyan has also found his voca­ti­on in cine­ma. Obviously, he would like to beco­me a direc­tor or an actor.

Alessandro likes to go to the cine­ma alo­ne becau­se then he can con­cen­tra­te ful­ly on the film. For him, an exci­ting plot and out­stan­ding actors are the decisi­ve fea­tures of a good film. So, it’s no sur­pri­se that PULP FICTION (US 1994. D: Quentin Tarantino) is Alessandro’s favo­ri­te film. He is equal­ly enthu­si­a­stic about hor­ror films.