Zeche is nich – Sieben Blicke auf das Ruhrgebiet 2010 (2010)

Seven episodes offer cinematic glimpses into different ways of life in today’s Ruhr region. The self-contained films do not follow one another in sequence, but are interwoven. The episodes have no points of contact in terms of content. Each episode has its own title. Austrian filmmaker Stephan Bergmann travels through the Ruhr region from east to west, hitchhiking along the A40, and gives the people he happens to meet plenty of time to speak. They include hardcore Schalke 04 fans, members of the car-tuning scene, and ordinary commuters. A lengthy scene from the notorious Nordkurve in the Veltins-Arena is also interspersed. In this comedy-style science-fiction episode, IRB#2600, a talking, irritable, beer-drinking pub robot, is fired by his boss, the owner of a Borussia Dortmund sports bar, and looks for a new job. Along the way, he has various adventures, including a quarrel with drinkers at a kiosk, working at an auto-parts factory, and playing the triangle in an orchestra. The lonely worker Eddi, whom the robot reminds of his deceased dog, “adopts” him, strokes him, and puts a collar around his neck. Wolfgang Weber, a somewhat out-of-touch man in his mid-thirties, is the son and grandson of miners, a bookworm, and the city archivist in Castrop-Rauxel. He finds an unusual way to connect his two passions—the biography of Irish mining pioneer William Thomas Mulvany and Indian culture: through intensive research, he tries to prove that a doctor he knows, who works in Castrop-Rauxel, is Mulvany reincarnated. He even travels to the Sri-Kamadchi-Ampal Temple in Hamm-Uentrop to seek spiritual support. The film leaves open whether the story is documentary or fiction. The eccentric timpanist Manfred struggles to fit in with the conservative musical tastes of his uniformed traditional band, the Bochumer Jungen—played by the Fanfarenzug Blau-Weiß Bochum-Hamme and the Bochumer Landsknecht Fanfarenzug. His penchant for musical rebelliousness is punished by the rule-abiding drum major and his colleagues with bullying and expulsion. Sad, Manfred travels through Bochum with his instrument by underground train and tram, feeling that he is being followed by a cleaner. At an underground station, where he happens to run into his colleagues again, Manfred suddenly turns things around: he gets the band, the drum major, and the cleaner swinging. The episode ends in a kind of exuberant, surreal musical scene. Unlike the other episodes, in which people talk a great deal, the characters in this episode remain silent, apart from the drum major’s instructions. Somewhere in the Ruhr region, the filmmaker visits a multicultural allotment garden. German, Turkish, Korean, and Eastern European plot holders tend their gardens peacefully side by side, though not without occasional conflict. The focus is on conversations, reflections on the “right” way to garden, and celebrations. The documentary focuses on Essen rapper and former career criminal Sinan-G. The musician of Iranian descent talks at length about his life, including criminal offenses, gunshot wounds, time in prison, and his rehabilitation through sport and music. His brother and manager, Roozbeh Farhangmehr, is also portrayed. This conventionally styled documentary short follows startup founder Beate Pracht through her working day as a llama therapist, her work with her animals, elderly people, and people with disabilities, and her work as an entrepreneur. This includes not only llama therapy but also organizing leisure events and stress-management seminars such as anti-burnout training. Pracht calls the renaturalized spoil heaps along the rural northern edge of Gelsenkirchen the “Andes of the Ruhr region,” including Halde Oberscholven.