Dao (German Theatrical Release Premiere)

A wedding in France and a funeral in Guinea-Bissau: Through these two rituals, director Alain Gomis connects family memory with collective history and cinematic fiction in *Dao*—spanning Europe and West Africa, life and death, past and present.

The film tells the story of a generation living between different places and memories. At its heart lies the question: What remains when families are scattered across continents? Which stories are told? And which remain unspoken for a long time?

The title Dao is inspired by Taoist ideas and stands for a continuous, cyclical flow of life that embodies the balance of opposites such as birth and death, migration and home, fiction and reality.

Professional and non-professional actors—including members of Gomis’s family—improvised during filming in situations deliberately kept open on set. The result is an immersive epic that brings its philosophy to life rather than explaining it: a collective act of remembrance, affirmation of life, and self-assurance. People gather, tell stories, remember, and together invent new forms of coexistence.

Following its world premiere in the competition at the 2026 Berlinale, Dao celebrates its German theatrical premiere with this screening at the HKW, in the presence of director Alain Gomis.

• Dao (German theatrical premiere)
• Film Screening

Dir.: Alain Gomis, 2026, France/Senegal/Guinea-Bissau, 185', French/Mandjak/Wolof/Portuguese Creole with English subtitles