Im Dickicht (2024)
experimental short, AT 2024, color, digital, 8 min, 4k DCP, 5.1 audio, no dialogue
“Like in a dream, shadowy landscapes pass by. Time and again, the silhouette of a decaying, overgrown ammunition hall breaks through the image. The gaze drifts toward the sky, searching for stability, only to lose itself once more in the dense forest. Katharina Pichler’s experimental film Im Dickicht unfolds a subtle, almost eerie tension through its alienated visual language and uses the forest as a metaphor for the complexity of human perception.” (Vienna Shorts 2025/Luise Linsenbolz)
Director/Production/Sound:
Katharina Pichler
DOP:
Harry Kemp
Montage:
Katharina Pichler
Harry Kemp
Color:
Arno Friebes
Fundings:
BMKÖS
CINE ART Land Steiermark
Kulturamt Stadt Graz
Festivals
Crossing Europe (May 2025) – Local Artist Competition
Vienna Shorts (May 2025) – Animation Avantgarde – Honorable Mention
Bridge Film Festival (July 2025/IT)
Jury Statement Vienna Shorts (2025):
“A visual meditation on the physical properties of the film camera: depth of field, unstable refractions, motion blur, chromatic distortions, bloom, and dispersion. By dissecting a forest and its historical traces, the film creates a dreamlike state where past and present merge through ghostly imagery of abandoned structures reclaimed by nature. It cultivates an outstanding atmosphere of quiet unease — reflecting the disorienting complexity of memory, perception, and the cinematic apparatus.”