Synopsis
In his first feature-length desktop documentary for cinema, filmmaker Kevin B. Lee delves into the historical traces of extremist propaganda and the efforts of those resisting its violent impacts. 'Afterlives' explores how to confront the violence encoded in this media, reaching beyond its toxic effects to engage power structures spanning from the colonial past to the digital age. Moving between virtual and physical environments, the film encounters an artist, an activist and a researcher, who each use the legacy of violent extremism to create new images and narratives with new possibilities for the future.
Credits
with
Kevin B. Lee, Morehshin Allahyari, Nava Zarabian, Anne Speckhard, Sebastian Baden, Bernd Zywietz, Yorck Beese, KAtrin Rademacher
Director & Script Kevin B. Lee
Director of Photography Ginan Seidl
Editor & Script Editor Janina Herhoffer
Sound Recording Aline Bonvin
Sound Design Laszlo Umbreit
Mix Rémi Gérard
Music Tadklimp, Maya Shenfeld
1st AD Konstanze Winter
Creative Producer & Dramaturg Mareike Bernien
Producer Caroline Kirberg
Co-Producers Beata Saboova, Vincent Metzinger
Produced by pong film, Berlin, Germany
In Co-Production with
Naoko Films, Brussels, Belgium
Pivonka Production, Paris, France
Production funded by
BKM, Germany
Eurimages Lab Project Awards
Field of Vision Grant, U.S.A.
CNAP, France
CCA, Belgium
Tax Shelter, Belgium
Distribution
Arsenal – Institut für Film und Videokunst e.V.
Gerichtstraße 53
13347 Berlin
distribution(at)arsenal-berlin.de
World Sales
Odd Slice Films
Schrottgasse 1
1030 Vienna
martina(at)oddslicefilms.de
Tel. +43 677 63411156
Kontakt Produktion pong
Caroline Kirberg
kirberg(at)pong-berlin.de
Tel. +49 (30) 61076098
Visuals
More
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festivals
World premiere: Doclisboa International Film Festival - New Visions 2025 (nominated for Best First Feature Award)
UK premiere: BFI London Film Festival - Experimenta Special Presentation 2025
Swedish premiere: Stockholm International Film Festival - Documentary Competition 2025
Italian premiere: Milano Filmmaker Festival 2025
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fact sheet
Year of production: 2025
Production countries: Germany, France, Belgium
Length: 88 Minuten
Format: DCP
Languages: English, German, with English, German and French subtitles
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texts about
BFI London Review: Kevin B. Lee's Debut Feature Afterlives Interrogates Terrorist Propaganda | Savina Petkova | The Film Stage
"(...) Afterlives is a dedicated, reflective documentary, the bell of its urgency ringing far into the futures of images."
Critique: Afterlives | David Katz | Cineuropa
"(...) Visceral and straightforwardly emotional... with eerie formal poetry in copious quantities."
Notes from London Film Festical (III.) | Joel Whitaker | Cinema Year Zero
"Lee has been far ahead of the curve for years in terms of how documentaris can streamline the conveyance of information, this film feels like a natural development of his style and voice."
AFTERLIVES | Giuseppe Di Salvatore | Filmexplorer
"(...) Afterlives is a kick-off film, as a starting point of a critical discussion that needs to be continued, as a temporary cinema crystallization that deconstructs the dynamic of spectacle in order to open up a restless, filmic territory where affective intelligence reactivates media theory."
