26/02/2026 - BERLINALE 2026: Daniela Magnani Hüller’s documentary is a complex, emotional and unflinchingly direct autobiographical film that convincingly paints femicide as a systemic issue

When she was 17, German-Brazilian filmmaker Daniela Magnani Hüller survived an attempted femicide. Now, 15 years later, she makes her debut in the Berlinale Forum with Sometimes, I See Them All at a Party, a formally complex, sensitive and unflinchingly direct autobiographical film that shared a Special Mention for the Berlinale Documentary Award with TUTU [+see also:
film review
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In her final year of high school, Magnani Hüller was subjected to unwanted advances, stalking, threats and, finally, a knife attack by a classmate. At the beginning of the film, through voice-over, she recounts the assault over footage of a Munich bus stop at night. The details are entirely impressionistic; it’s about what she felt and what was going through her head as she ran towards three people standing on the street, who essentially dismissed her.

The film has several narrative lines, and director of cinematography Noah Böhm employs a range of filming techniques. In the factual strand, shot on hi-res digital, Magnani Hüller speaks with people involved at the time: a policewoman, a doctor, a teacher, a schoolmate and a legal expert from her school who accompanied her to the court hearing. Some of these scenes take place in large, empty waiting rooms that could belong to a courthouse or a hospital, where she sits with them at a table, her back turned to the camera. We never fully see her face, except in a few photographs from her youth at the beginning of the film and in a short scene at the very end. This points to her vulnerability and, through these conversations, we learn first-hand how women are left unprotected and distrusted - from family and school to legal, health and judicial systems.

In parallel, the director recounts her memories against abstract or symbolic images shot on low-res digital, 16mm and Super 8: a blurry yellow wall with a hanging wire, reflection of a wristwatch on the ceiling, a dead butterfly being pinned to a board… These are connected to her experiences and feelings following the attack - her self-image, fear and struggle with mental health - but there are also some warmer segments. The title of the film refers to all the women who didn’t survive femicide, which she evokes vividly, suggesting that a sense of survivor’s guilt may also be present.

When Magnani Hüller travels to Brazil to reunite with her half-sister, the grey, sterile Munich is replaced by vibrant Rio and lush nature, with a focus on tactile elements, implying a rebirth - or at least an attempt at one. But a cruel, enraging twist at the end hammers home femicide as a systemic issue, extending far beyond the retraumatisation the legal system imposes on victims.

There is no music score, besides a couple of Brazilian songs and one jarring saxophone improvisation, but the sound design by Andrew Mottl is detailed and precisely used, ranging from naturalistic to impressionistic. Even if the multitude of filming techniques does not seem entirely necessary, editor Melanie Jilg smartly brings them together.

Magnani Hüller’s film is deeply courageous and painfully personal, but even more importantly, it unflinchingly accuses not only the system, but society and culture at large through evidence of her own experience. For all its sensitivity, emotions and abstract imagery, this is a sober and highly accomplished, very direct piece of documentary cinema. 

Sometimes, I See Them All at a Party was produced by Cologne-based Bildersturm Filmproduktion, in co-production with ZDF and University of Television and Film Munich.