Before we dive headfirst into our fabulous festival program and start patting ourselves on the back, we’d like to shine a spotlight on a project that instantly caught our attention. We’re talking about THE MAN FROM SOMALIA. The film hasn’t been made yet. Bringing it to life is proving more difficult than expected. However, the idea has been brewing and taking shape in the minds of the directing duo Nik Sentenza and Johannes Kizler for several years now and has already taken on quite concrete form.
Here’s the story: A Somali refugee who wants nothing more than peace for himself and his family must defend himself against a group of neo-Nazis. The project is planned as a feature film, a modern Western set somewhere in rural Germany. It will explore themes such as the search for identity, the right to a new home, and resistance against right-wing violence. What sounds extremely interesting has already been through a three-year odyssey through German TV editorial offices. There, the project met with a lot of enthusiasm, but also a lot of concerns and reservations about its realization. “The subject matter is controversial”—Nik and Johannes are well aware of that.Packing such a politically charged topic into a genre film—apparently, no one wants to get their fingers burned by that. It is precisely this risk that the two directors now want to take on without the support of a TV network; they intend to self-finance the project and have recently launched a Start Next campaign to gather support.
We know all too well the challenges filmmakers in Germany face when they try to get a controversial genre film off the ground. HARD:LINE hopes to give this project a little boost. Partly out of self-interest, so we don’t run out of German genre films. But mostly because we recognize the potential and believe this could be the right film for these polarizing, politically controversial times.
The pitch for *THE MAN FROM SOMALIA* will conclude our special program “Highlight Deutsches Kino,” which takes place on Friday, April 17, 2026. Following the two main films—both world premieres, by the way—and the subsequent Q&A, we want to give the two filmmakers an opportunity to present their project.
So if German genre films are close to your heart, be sure to check it out, meet Nik and Johannes at our festival, and—if you’d like—support us however you can. Thanks for reading—here are all the important links!
Start-Next Campaign:
https://www.startnext.com/der-mann-aus-somalia
Website:
