Hans Jürgen Syberberg at 90

Hans Jürgen Syberberg may be less familiar to mainstream audiences than Wim Wenders or Volker Schlöndorff, yet he remains a key figure of postwar West German cinema: a maverick, an enfant terrible who never positioned himself within the cinematic mainstream of the New German Cinema, instead forging his own path and provoking with unconventional ideas—though never for shock value alone. His films, many of which grapple with German history, continue to polarize to this day, not least "Hitler: A Film from Germany" (1977), in which he explored Hitler as a figure through the question of whether he embodied the projection of the German people's most secret desires. While his work has often been met with skepticism in Germany, international intellectuals such as Susan Sontag, Michel Foucault, and Albert Serra count among Syberberg's admirers. On the occasion of the film maker's 90th birthday on December 8, the DFF – Deutsches Filminstitut & Filmmuseum in Frankfurt am Main is paying tribute to the director with a special homage. Syberberg will be present on December 9 for the opening and the world premiere of the third part of his highly personal trilogy "Demmin Cantos."