Projekt Ballhausplatz (2023)

The film traces Sebastian Kurz’s political career, from the campaign for the 2010 Vienna state and municipal elections through his subsequent roles as State Secretary for Integration, Foreign Minister and Federal Party Chairman of the Austrian People’s Party (ÖVP), and, from 2017, Federal Chancellor of the Republic of Austria. The strategy for attaining the chancellorship became known as Project Ballhausplatz, named after the Ballhausplatz in front of the Austrian Federal Chancellery. Drawing on accounts by people who worked alongside him and a collage of video and film archive material, director Kurt Langbein documents how a group around Kurz, known as the Praetorians, was able to take up key positions in the Republic, and how the Ibiza affair and, ultimately, the ÖVP corruption affair led Kurz to withdraw from politics.