“Brunapark” – how the memories are built, and how the documentary cinema place a crucial role in saving them from oblivion
The recent surge in the popularity of documentary film — both in terms of production and audience interest — reflects several ongoing global processes. Social, political and the art world to be exact. On one hand, what we see today is a slow decline of importance and meaning of information and stories transmitted through written word – with equal rise of the images. Consuming films, tv series and micro-forms like videos and memes on social media is a daily habit, invisible and ever present. In a way it’s a return to origins of human communication: oral narratives and visual ones, be it drawings on a wall of a cave, sculpture of a god or Rembrandt’s Night Watch. These artworks not only were an expression of taste and talent of an artist, but they were also meant to communicate “we are here”, “this is who we are”, “this is what happened to us”. With time the communication became more and more complex, offering reflection on humanity, morality and eventually offering an intervention. Documentary cinema – or cinema tasjiliya, which is an Arab term, appropriate when reporting on an Ismailia International Film Festival for Documentaries and Shorts held in Egypt – has been following the same goals of communication as its “still” predecessors. It preserves memory, establishes new visual language and indicates what is important to look at.
Additionally, the non-fiction filmmaking can be an artistic expression of director’s vision, making it close to narrative forms. But probably the most popular, predominant genre, and perhaps the most noble one is a socially engaged documentary film. With the camera peeking in the dark corners of the countries and cities, it reports in more nuanced way on human and un-human living conditions. TV segments in the news broadcasts offer numbers, facts and decision made by politicians and powerful companies. They announce, they inform, sometimes they manipulate data, and images are just serving the purpose.
The documentary films are more elaborated and complex. They show microworlds, people’s perspectives, emotions or side with those who pay real price of economical advancement. They help to understand broader perspective, offer and teach compassion. And if the world needs anything right now it’s compassion. Documentary cinema thus reflect the evolution of the art, as well as the way we use and consume both information and stories.
Where to look for meaningful images and why they matter?
A good address to see these stories, but also to reflect on the medium itself is, of course, a film festival. The Feature Documentary Competition of the 26th Ismailia IFF, the oldest film event of this kind in Egypt, offered a selection that shows different types and different roles of documentary films. These titles delved into the past to uncover and possibly heal wounds (“Greeline” by Sylvie Ballyot), show small and simple life on a farm in Argentina (“Where the Trees Bear Meat” by Alexis Franco), imaginative exploration of memory and AI interventions (“And There Was Evening and There Was Morning. The First Day” by Youhanna Nagy, a FIPRESCI award winner), be crazy expression of director’s singular vision (“Shahid” by Narges Kalhor). Or they show how a big company is trying to make an even bigger profit at the expense of a small community (“Brunapark” by Felix Herger and Dominik Zietlow).
Among the films shows in the competition, “Brunapark” stands out as a modest, honest and persistent voice against social injustice. That topic is not only relevant in the developing countries, or these that are under threat of a political nature. In satiated societies of the so called “West” it may be even more crucial to point at unjust rulings of politicians or corporations. If the economical leaders forget or ignore the ethical values, what example they give to others, still aspiring to this level of life?
The directors of “Brunapark” – operating in a realistic style, with handheld camera – were observing a Zurich neighbourhood, the eponymous Brunapark, that consists of 5 residential buildings and 405 apartments – homes for hundreds of people. The owner of the building, the Credit Suisse pension fund, wants to demolish the area and a social tissue in order to build a new, and fancy property complex, that will give the company much bigger profit. The cost that Credit Suisse is paying would be renting machines destroying the existing buildings, the price of the materials used to erect new brave world in the neighbourhood. But the real cost would be paid by the 405 tenants, who build a life and social ties there, whose fates will be altered. On the top of that, these plans would further the gentrification of the city, which is a fate of many other locations in Europe. The healthy urban social tissue consisting of people with different economic, cultural and professional background is replaced by a homogeneous group of privileged, while the less privileged are pushed out to outskirts or poor suburbs. It may seem like a purely economic process, the works of invisible hand of neo-capitalism and neo-liberalism, but it’s not. It’s deepening the social division into two groups, with money being a dividing factor. Without oversimplifying the global shifts and dynamics, the seemingly small actions like that described in “Brunapark” have significantly bigger consequence.
The mission of the two emerging documentary filmmakers in this case was to put spotlight on the process and wake the social conscious of decisionmakers, as well as informing the local audience of what is happening on their ground. The directors turn the camera on ordinary people – the pizza place owner, the septuagenarian, who won’t be able to afford living anywhere else or the group of kids and the group of teens roaming free around the buildings and the areas. Running around, making pranks or just socializing is an important aspect of growing up and becoming a social creature, which “Brunapark” notes on many occasions. They spent 3 years filming the area and the tenants, observing the changes in the life of the community, as the Credit Suisse’s deadline of demolition approaches. They protest, they petition, but it seems like their voice is muffled by fingers typing numbers into a spreadsheet.
Blame it on oat milk!
With time, some people move out, while others move in, already changing the dynamics in the area. Felix Hergert and Dominik Zietlow discuss a macro-process but focus on daily life and its cute or quirky little moments – like riding a narrow elevator, carrying a huge teddy bear on a neck or winning a lottery by one of the teenagers. The latter scene is also a symbolical one: life is a bit like either winning a lottery – being born in a rich part of the world or not winning. And a chance, a coincidence or a choice made by external forces can alter everything in an instant. These scraps, tiny scenes from life build memories, identity, sense of belonging, which are basic human needs, after physiological and safety needs are met, according to a famous pyramid theory by Abraham Maslow. Place and people, who surround us, and who are not our family, create who we are – and “Brunapark” emphasises through moving images, edited together.
One of the tenants singled out by the documentarians is a pizza maker, who has been feeding neighbours for almost three decades. Small, modest place will be replaced by a trendy café that has all kinds of drip coffees and selection of vegan milk alternatives. It won’t be a place offering new memories, it will only offer a high bill. In this juxtaposition the theme of the film reoccurs – pizza was initially affordable, “poor people” food, (before becoming an urban trend), while an oat flat white is a symbol of daily luxury and price speculation. It’s an artistic way to echo the social statement that Felix Hergert and Dominik Zietlow are making.
“Brunapark” through patience and dedication forges an empathy-based connection with the tenants and the audience. It’s one of the films that nurture empathy, and which was made with honesty and authenticity. It doesn’t have visual fireworks, or offer solution to world’s problems, but cultivate understanding and compassion, as well as encourage to reflect on how the individual life experience is build, and what social responsibility is.
It’s also a way the two directors, who are relatively early in their artistic career, hone their skills in telling stories, observing the characters, studying them, and understanding what type of stories they want to tell the world. What kind of a drawing they want to leave in their cave, metaphorically speaking.
Ola Salwa
©FIPRESCI 2025