‘Meeting Gorbachev - Werner Herzog & André Singer’

In the presence of André Singer

On 13 June, BOZAR CINEMA and the Goethe-Institut Brüssel present “Meeting Gorbachev” by Werner Herzog and André Singer. This documentary focuses on the life and work of Michail Gorbachev, the former leader of the Soviet Union, and sheds light on the end of the USSR.

Following the Berlinale Forum in September and the Duisburger Filmwoche in March, BOZAR CINEMA and the Goethe-Institut Brüssel are joining forces yet again to present a selection from Doc Leipzig. 

Ralph Eue, the man responsible for the Doc Leipzig programme, and André Singer will be in conversation after the screening.

Very few politicians in the second half of the twentieth century played as decisive a role as Mikhail Gorbachev. From 1985 to 1991 he was Secretary General of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. His term of office saw the beginning of nuclear disarmament, glasnost, perestroika, German reunification and the collapse of the Soviet Union. In 1990 he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. Filmmaker Werner Herzog makes no secret of his admiration for Gorbachev. He and co-director André Singer visited Gorbachev on three occasions in 2017 and 2018. During the conversation, the 88-year-old Gorbachev looks back on his political career and private life. Recordings of the conversation are combined with archive material. “Meeting Gorbachev” does not just focus on the politician’s historical achievements but also gives insight into his thoughts and feelings.

Werner Herzog was born in Munich in 1942. He grew up in a mountain village in Bavaria and studied history and German literature in Munich and Pittsburgh. He produced his first film in 1961, at 19 years of age. Since then he has made, written and produced more than sixty films and documentaries, including “Aguirre, the Wrath of God” (1972), “Fitzcarraldo” (1982) and “Cave of Forgotten Dreams” (2010). Werner Herzog lives in Munich and Los Angeles.
André Singer is a documentary maker and anthropologist. He was born in London and studied in England at University Hall Buckland, and Oxford University. Since the 1970s he has worked for, amongst others, the Discovery Channel, Alliance Atlantis and the BBC. Since 1992 he has regularly collaborated with Werner Herzog and they have made 15 films together, including “The Wild Blue Yonder” (2005). Singer was President of the Royal Anthropological Institute in London and lectured at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles and the University of Westminster in London.