The Long Road to the Director's Chair

The “First International Women’s Film Seminar” organised by filmmakers Claudia von Alemann and Helke Sander in 1973 can be regarded as one of the very first feminist film festivals. Held in Berlin, it was hosted in the “old” Arsenal cinema in Welserstraße and the primary school opposite. Vibeke Løkkeberg, a 28-year-old filmmaker and former actress from Norway, was among the guests travelling to the event. She came to present her film Abort and to document the festival. Almost fifty years later, Løkkeberg found the raw footage – sound and images – once thought lost, and turned it into a film resembling a journey through time: interviews with the participants sharing experiences as equals, patient listening, the crowds in the foyer, the comings and goings outside the cinema, the gatherings at the seminar. The air was full of new beginnings and cigarette smoke, solidarity and openness, the determination and confidence of women who wanted fundamental change in film and television – against the dominance of men. Today, this retrospective confronts us with unfinished battles and possibly – lost hopes.