Thomas Giefer

Thomas Giefer (born November 15, 1944 on the island of Reichenau ) is a German documentary filmmaker and journalist .

Life

Thomas Giefer is a son of the renowned Frankfurt architect Alois Giefer .

After several semesters in literature and journalism in Frankfurt am Main and at the Free University of Berlin , Giefer was admitted to the Berlin Film Academy dffb in 1967 . He had already started to document the first sit-ins and demonstrations of the emerging student movement in West Berlin with a borrowed 16 mm handheld camera - and not from the perspective of the press and state media, but as almost the only cameraman from the Perspective of the students themselves. This resulted in his first film "Berlin, June 2, 1967" about the anti-Shah demonstration and the death of Benno Ohnesorg , which he and HR Minow used as an instrument of the "counter -public " to the propaganda of the springer press and other media put together. Due to political upheaval at the university, film studies were terminated after a few months by relegation. Together with other relegates, he founded the ROSTA KINO, a theater, distribution and production of films in the field of APO and worldwide revolutionary movements.

Since 1974 Giefer has been working as an author, director, cameraman and film editor, as well as a freelance producer (CON VOI FILM, Berlin), primarily for public television and later for the Franco-German cultural channel Arte . His focus: socially critical documentaries, politics and culture, e.g. B. for the WDR series "Schauplatz", occasionally also magazine articles for Weltspiegel , Monitor etc.

Since 1979 he turned to foreign topics - first about the Iranian revolution , then he made films in Iraq , Kurdistan , Pakistan , Afghanistan , Central Asia , Africa , Latin America , the USA and Europe - mostly in collaboration with authors such as Ulrich Tilgner , Jürgen Roth , Yüksel Uğurlu or Ahmad Taheri. Since the beginning of the 1990s, historical documentaries have also been produced for the ARD series “Political Murder” and “The Red Square” - often together with Rena Giefer.

Many of the films can be seen at festivals and in political events - even after they have been broadcast on TV: For example "The Rattenlinie ", a documentary about the useful role of the Cold War for the impunity of Nazis and war criminals, "With the courage of the desperate "About the Jewish resistance against Hitler ," Death in Tehran "about the murder of oppositionists Parwaneh and Dariusch Foruhar by the secret service of the Islamic Republic," Frances Newton's last words "about the execution of a young black woman in Texas," Slavery in Italian "about the inhumane exploitation of harvest workers from Eastern Europe and Africa .

The film "Murder in Colonial Style" about the assassination of the first Congolese Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba in 1961 was shown in more than 20 countries and in 2001 received - among other international awards - the Grimme Gold Prize.

Filmography (selection)

• 1967: Berlin, June 2, 67
• 1968: Terror in the West too
• 1977: News from the tribe of the Mandan Indians
• 1981: Shah Matt - Revolution in Iran
• 1983: The Kurds - a people that shouldn't exist
• 1984: This spontaneous work stoppage was not planned - the Turkish strike at Ford
• 1987: Operation Harvest - Chronicle of a coup in Africa
• 1989: What Really Happened in Upington - Racial Justice in South Africa
• 1990: The rat line - escape routes of the Nazis
• 1991: Jihad - The Holy War
• 1992: Passport Mafia - The Cold Street of Hope
• 1992: Dwarf Brazil - The Ecology of Hunger
• 1993: Did I already say that I am Jewish - the writer Valentin Senger
• 1993: Heaven over Europe - Reports with limited hope (three-part series)
• 1996: Power, Oil and Death - Ken Saro-Wiwa
• 1998: Death in Memphis - The murder of Martin Luther King a . a. Conversation with James Earl Ray
• 1999: Farewell to the God state? - 20 years of the Islamic Revolution
• 2000: Colonial Murder - Patrice Lumumba
• 2000: Flight ET 961 hijacked - the crash, the passengers and a riddle
• 2001: The mayor, the entertainer, the interior decorator and his wife - Berlin has the choice
• 2003: Romero - death of an archbishop
• 2004: Death in Tehran - contract murder in the name of God
• 2005: With the courage of the desperate - Jewish resistance against Hitler
• 2006: Frances Newton's Last Words - Chronicle of an Execution
• 2007: Slavery in Italian / Bloody Harvest

radio

• 2001: We cut the corpses into pieces
• 2006: Murder in Mecca

Texts

• The documentary since 1960 by Wilhelm Roth (Bucher 1990, ISBN 3-7658-0397-9 ) about "Berlin, June 2nd, 67" and "Terror also in the West"
• The rat line (escape routes of the Nazis) by Rena and Thomas Giefer (athenäums program by anton hain 1991, ISBN 3-445-08566-8 )
• The rat line (escape routes of the Nazis) by Rena and Thomas Giefer (Beltz-Verlag 1995, ISBN 3-89547-700-1 )
• The rat line (escape routes of the Nazis) by Rena and Thomas Giefer (Japanese edition 2000, ISBN 4-7684-6836-5 )
• Death to Order - Political Murder in the 20th Century, Ed. Heribert Blondiau (Ullstein 2002, ISBN 978-3548363318 ) Chapter on Martin Luther King and Patrice Lumumba

Awards & festivals

• Leipzig (Special Prize 1967)
• Grimme Prize w. gold
• INPUT 2002 Cape Town
• Intermedia-globe Gold (World Media Festival)
• Gold WorldMedal (The New York Festivals)
• Opening film CINÉ DROIT LIBRE Ouagadougou and Abidjan
• Havana Film Festival
• FIPA (Meilleur image)
• BANFF (1st prize "Current affairs")
• Monaco (Grand Prix URTI)

Web links

• Thomas Giefer in the Internet Movie Database (English)
• http://bewegung.nostate.net/refe.html