Film ohne Grenzen — Film Festival Bad Saarow

Films by the Lake — A Festival with Conviction

The Film ohne Grenzen festival is one of Germany's most remarkable small film festivals. Since 2013, it has brought together international filmmakers, actors, screenwriters, and a highly interested audience at the Scharmützelsee in Bad Saarow once a year — one of Brandenburg's most beautiful lake landscapes, about an hour southeast of Berlin. The 14th edition runs from September 3rd to 6th, 2026. The festival center since its inception has been the Eibenhof with its Kulturscheune (cultural barn), complemented by the Cinema by Velotel.

2026 Motto — „WIRKLICH"

The 2026 festival motto is „WIRKLICH" (REAL) — an exploration of authenticity in a world where AI-generated images, manipulated realities, and digital staging are taking over everyday life. The 2026 film selection will accordingly focus on themes such as truth, reality, and documentary responsibility. As filmmaker Volker Schlöndorff said about the festival: „the most vibrant exchange one could wish for."

Format — Films, Discussions, Scholarship

The program spans four days: documentaries, feature films, and short films in several sections, each followed by discussions with directors, actors, or producers. A dedicated section for young people with film workshops for school classes rounds off the program. The festival highlight on Sunday is the traditional Sunday Round with Gero von Boehm, which has gathered prominent guests from film and culture for years over the festival weekend. The festival also awards the Wolfgang Kohlhaase Scholarship for an emerging screenwriter — named after the GDR and all-German screenwriting great from Bad Saarow, who passed away in 2022.

Eibenhof — Cultural Barn on the Scharmützelsee

The Eibenhof Bad Saarow (Alte Eichen 26a, 15526 Bad Saarow) is a traditional estate on the west bank of the Scharmützelsee, operated as a cultural venue by the Vahl family. The Kulturscheune Eibenhof is the festival's main venue — a converted barn with approx. 200 seats, high-quality projection, and unusually good acoustics. The venue is complemented by the neighboring Cinema by Velotel. The intimate atmosphere — not a multiplex, but a film space where audience, filmmakers, and organizers meet — is the festival's hallmark.

Bad Saarow — Spa Town on the Scharmützelsee

Bad Saarow is a municipality of just under 5,800 inhabitants in the Oder-Spree district of Brandenburg. The town on the west bank of the Scharmützelsee (a volcanic lake over 12 km long, the largest lake in Brandenburg after Schwielochsee) has been known for over a hundred years as a spa town with thermal baths and hotels. In the 1920s, greats like Maxim Gorky and Henry Vahl lived here, and later the film city tradition emerged with film locations and artists' villas. Today, Bad Saarow is a preferred weekend destination for Berliners — and with „Film ohne Grenzen", one of Germany's most unusual film festival venues.