ANNA - A Tale for Tomorrow

ANNA - A Tale for Tomorrow is a 40-minute time travel film about our lives in the escalating climate crisis. It tells the story of Anna, a 16-year old girl who is haunted by nightmarish visions of a future destroyed by the climate catastrophe and war. She is certain that the world is coming to an end and there is nothing she can do about it. One day she inexplicably wakes up in the year 2082 and realizes, that her worst visions have come true. Together with her granddaughter Nova, Anna must find a way through the destroyed world back to the year 2023 - and her own strength.

The film forms the starting point for a Germany-wide educational campaign. By taking an honest look at climate fear, hope and our own responsibility in the face of the impending climate catastrophe, we want to create a new approach to the topic. In discussion rounds, talks and group activities, we bring people together, educate them, create space for thoughts and feelings and motivate them to take new, collective action that can combat powerlessness and bring about the necessary changes.

By the way: Our film is the official adaptation of the novel The World According to Anna by bestselling author Jostein Gaarder (best known for his novel Sophie's World). It can be shown in German and English.

Our film deals with the theme of despair and powerlessness, which is felt above all by the younger generation. Social media is fuelling the perceived lack of prospects very much.
At the same time, we see in climate movements (such as Fridays for Future or Just Stop Oil / Letzte Generation) that the strength, the protest and the call for change mainly comes from young people. Our film therefore is particularly aimed at them, because it says: You are not alone. There is a reason why you feel this way and we show you a way to deal with it.

Ultimately, however, it takes all parts of society to bring about the urgently needed changes. That's why we focus the educational work for our film on all those who - like our main character - find themselves feeling hopeless and powerless and are looking for a way to deal with this. We have experienced ourselves that being part of a community can strengthen us and motivate us to take new action. That is why the primary goal of our educational work is to bring people together with the film. By realising that we're not alone, we can overcome our fears and take action. And by confronting the realities of our lives and our sphere of influence, we can find ways to create real change. We encourage this in our workshop and dialogue formats.

In concrete terms, our impact work takes place on three levels:

• On a self-organised cinema tour. We will travel to as many German cities as possible with our film. After the film, we let climate scientists and people who work in climate protection speak. With this step we want create the basis for a solution-oriented group discussion.

• By working with NGOs, such as environmental organisations or initiatives for political education or youth work, we create collaborations. We use the film screening as a starting point for themed workshops and further activities.

• At film festivals, we show the film to an interested cinema audience and use the subsequent Q&A sessions to press attention. We want to to raise awareness for our mission and encourage the audience to take action.

Our film comes at a time in which most of us are tired of news and feel hopeless. We respond to this reality with a time travel story. This creates a completely different, emotional confrontation. We are convinced that the emotional power contained in our film can achieve something that cannot be achieved through data, facts and words. Together with Anna, we find out how we can overcome the feeling of paralysis, despair and powerlessness and find new strength.

Through our many years of work on the non-profit film project ANNA, we were able to establish valuable contacts with a wide range of stakeholders in climate and environmental protection. This network now forms the starting point for planning our impact campaign. With the cooldown°earth foundation, the Okeanos Foundation for the Sea and the Protestant Church of Northern Germany, we already have strong partners who have developed an extensive educational programme for young people and adults around the film. Their work encourages us and is a foretaste of what we can still achieve by networking with other NGOs.

At the end of January, our film will celebrate its world premiere in competition at the renowned Max Ophüls Preis film festival in Saarbrücken. We are making the most of the attention: it is the perfect prelude to our further plans for the film. Do we have your support?

In order to make our film visible throughout Germany and accessible to a wide audience, we primarily need funds for public relations, train tickets and renting halls to show the movie.

Our extrapolation shows: With every euro donated, we can make the film accessible to at least one new person as part of an educational screening. If you double your contribution, we will also be able to pay our impact team an expense allowance for their important work. This will allow us to dedicate even more time and love to the work on our educational campaign and distribute the film even faster.