Anmaßung

PRESUMPTION begins with a question: what do we see when we cannot see the person at the centre of a story? Stefan S., who is serving a life sentence for stalking and murdering a former colleague, refuses to show his face. Rather than treating this absence as an obstacle, the film makes it the starting point of its inquiry. Directors Chris Wright and Stefan Kolbe replace the missing image with hand puppets, puppeteers, masks, mirrors and projections. These theatrical elements do not reconstruct the crime but examine how images are created, interpreted and trusted. Throughout the film, voice-over reflections openly question the filmmakers' own methods and the ethics of documentary representation. The result is neither a portrait of a perpetrator nor a conventional true-crime documentary. Instead, PRESUMPTION asks how we construct an image of another person, how violence can be represented responsibly and where documentary filmmaking reaches its limits. Premiering in the Forum section of the Berlin International Film Festival 2021, PRESUMPTION is a formally inventive documentary that reflects as much on its own making as on the crime at its centre.