Susan Gordanshekan

Susan Gordanshekan (born December 19, 1978 in Kassel ) is a German film director and screenwriter of Iranian origin.

Life

Susan Gordanshekan’s parents, Mohammad Gordanshekan and Batul Torabian, come from the city of Isfahan in Iran . Susan Gordanshekan grew up bilingual and had insights into both German and Iranian culture. After graduating from the Lutherschule in Hanover, she did a voluntary social year with the Johannitern in the care of the elderly.

She then studied communication design from 1998 to 2003 , specializing in multimedia design, at the Hanover University of Applied Sciences (FHH) for design and media. In 2001, thanks to a grant from the Franco-German Youth Office , she studied communication design with a focus on video design at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Saint-Etienne / France for over half a year. This was followed by an internship at the multimedia agency Eurasset in Lyon / France for another six months. Since 2002 she has worked in various freelance activities at Norddeutscher Rundfunk . In 2003 she finished her studies with the production of her first film Can you see music . This project sparked her interest in film directing, which is why she completed an internship in story development at Herrmannfilm in Berlin in 2004.

In 2004 Susan Gordanshekan began studying documentary film and television journalism at the Munich University of Television and Film (HFF Munich) . There she made a documentary and feature films. The film Eisblumen , which was shown at the Berlin International Film Festival in 2011 , was made as part of the course. In 2013, Gordanshekan was selected as one of six international filmmakers for the La Résidence Cinefondation grant at the Cannes International Film Festival . After the short film In Limbo (2016), after completing her studies, she made her feature film debut The Defect Cat , which premiered at the Berlin International Film Festival in 2018 . The film, co-produced by Arte and Bayerischer Rundfunk, was released in German cinemas on October 4, 2018. Susan Gordanshekan received the German Director Award Metropolis from the Federal Association of Directing as the best young director for Die defekte Katzen .

Theming

Susan Gordanshekan was shaped by her existence between cultures. It reflects the discrepancy within one's own personality and the recognition from outside that every person with a migration background feels. In this way she emotionally gets closer to the social fringe groups of society, which she repeatedly addresses in her films: people whom society tolerates at most on its fringes.

Already in her first film Can you see music? she reported on the lives of three blind people and their everyday problems. In Tarof she showed both the advantages and disadvantages of living between two cultures and portrayed the longings of many people with a migration background of the second generation. In Garçons manqués , the life situation of individual players in a girls' football team with a migration background in a Paris suburb was filmed. Prejudices regarding their role as women, xenophobia and violence as well as a tense political situation are part of everyday life in the Paris suburb of Montfermeil . Her film Eisblumen deals with the problem of a Bosnian living illegally in Germany and Ms. Osterloh who is cared for by dementia.

Film awards

Documentary film prize of the Interfilm Short Film Festival Berlin for Garçons manqués
Best First Documentary Award Docúpolis 2008 of the International Documentary Film Festival of Barcelona for Garçons manqués
Golden Unicorn of the Alpinale Vorarlberg in the category Best Short Film University for Ice Flowers
Award "best short film" at the 17th Film Festival Turkey / Germany in Nuremberg for ice flowers
German Director Award Metropolis 2018 from the Federal Association of Directing as the best young director for The Defective Cat
Award "Best Director" at the Snowdance Independent Film Festival 2019 for the defective cat
The German film and media rating for their film Garçons Manqués "particularly valuable"
From the German film and media rating for ice flowers the rating "valuable".

Filmography

year	Movie title	Film type	language	activity
2003	Can you see music?	documentary	German	Direction, script, camera, editing
2005	Tarof	Short film	German-Persian	Direction, screenplay, editing
2007	Garçons manqués	documentary	French	Direction, script, editing
2008	Up close	Short film	German	Director
2011	Ice flowers	Short film	German / Bosnian	Direction, screenplay, editing
2016	In limbo	Short film	Farsi / English	Director, screenplay, producer
2018	The broken cat	Feature film	Farsi / German	Director, screenplay

Web links

Individual evidence

↑ Susan Gordanshekan: Ice flowers. (PDF; 65 kB) in the Berlinale catalog

↑ Susan Gordanshekan. on: festival-cannes.com (Cinéfondation grant "La Résidence" des Festival de Cannes)

^ Limbo on the director's website

↑ The defective cat in the catalog of the Berlinale 2018

↑ List of the award winners ( Memento of the original from October 18, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (PDF; 334 kB) of the Interfilm Festival @1@ 2

↑ Docúpolis 2008: Films ( Memento of the original from September 7, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2
↑ Prize winners ( Memento of the original from March 5, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. the Alpinale 2011. @1@ 2