’68 film experiments: New waves on the long march into postmodernism

The years around 1968 were marked by a desire for social and aesthetic experiments, combined with hopes for a better future. Which stylistic innovations and perspectives in terms of content were evident in the films of that time? On June 14, 2018, the ZKM will present a film exploratorium by and with Wolfgang Petroll on this exciting and culturally diverse epoch.

The innovation and joy of experimentation of the 1968s were also evident in feature films: the new waves of European film cultures reached their peak in Hollywood. The hope for a better modernity was connected with a reassessment of modern history (e.g. in the Western genre), as well as deep scepticism about real existing modernization effects. »Easy Rider« already made it clear: the »Summer of Love« was over, hope for something new and failure due to the forces of persistence were close together. As a result, the long march into postmodernism began...

What stylistic innovations and content-related perspectives were shown in the films of the 1968s? What is their cultural sustainability and undiminished topicality? The film exploratorium illustrates this with examples from films of those years: Godard and Kubrick, Kluge and Fassbinder, Antonioni and Leone, Polanski and Buñuel, among others. In the end, this leads us to the questions: Has the »Enlightenment« project failed because of the »Serenity« of postmodernism, or is it waiting for new momentum? And: how much utopia, how much revolution does a culture need to survive?