Filmhouse/New Kalamata Cinema Club-IN THE TEACHERS' OFFICE

A student of Turkish origin in the first grade of a high school is targeted for a series of thefts that have occurred at the school. Math teacher Carla decides to take it upon herself to investigate the thefts and exonerate the little boy. Still, she gradually becomes entangled in a complex moral maze of good intentions, flippant manipulations, wrong choices and misunderstandings. As she desperately tries to do everything right, she is faced not only with her aggressive colleagues and indignant parents but also with her students, whom she never stops supporting.

This is the fourth feature film by the Berlin-based, Turkish-born director Ilker Çatak. Avoiding one-dimensional didactic crowns, he delivers lessons in studied script, acting and direction, in how a schoolroom social drama transforms into a suspenseful thriller.

With Marvin Miller's evocative background music in sync with Carla's beating heart, the camera runs down corridors or locks in front of stern stares. At the same time, the director of photography, Judith Kaufman, gradually removes the colour from the cheeks of the romantic teacher, the school walls, and the objects' warmth. While Katak raises the intensity, Kaufman emotionally sterilises the spaces. All of this is impressively balanced with the unique interpretation of Leonie Benes, where idealistic stubbornness, naivety, conflict, fear, despair, rage, and resignation are "said" with her body language and the expression of her eyes.

The film was awarded in the "Panorama" section at the Berlin festival, is a candidate for the LUX prize of the European Parliament and is this year's German proposal for the Oscars.

WEDNESDAY 07 FEBRUARY
IN THE TEACHERS' OFFICE – DAS LEHRERZIMMER
Drama | K-13 | 2023 | Ger | 98'
directed by: Ilker Çatak
starring: Leonie Benesch, Leonard Stettnisch, Eva Löbau
21:00 | Thod. Aggelopoulos Amphitheatre, Kalamata Labour Centre

General admission is 5 euros. Admission is 3 euros for the unemployed, those with many children, and students, and it is free for those under 18.