Kant – Das Experiment der Freiheit

Кант. Эксперимент свободы

Three hundred years after the birth of the German philosopher Immanuel Kant (1724-1804), “Kant – Das Experiment der Freiheit" directed by Wilfried Hauke, returns the viewers to the city of Königsberg (modern Kaliningrad) in the18th century with elements of reconstruction. Kant, born in this city in 1724, was already one of the foremost Enlightenment thinkers during his lifetime; he remains one of the most influential figures in Western philosophy. He not only wanted to explain the world, but at the same time realized that he himself - like all people - had a limited capacity for understanding. He never left his native Königsberg, learning about world events from books that were sent to him from England and France. Everything he knew about people was the result of tireless observation of his surroundings and his own emotional life. He combined all this knowledge into a complex system of concepts, categories, and matrices. The result, a moral philosophy, the universal validity of which was constantly tested. On April 22, 2024, the 300th anniversary of Immanuel Kant will be celebrated. Made especially for this anniversary, the film shows how closely Kant was connected with his native Königsberg, which comes to life on screen (with the help of animation) as an 18th-century city. Many of the pressing questions that plagued people 300 years ago are posed anew in the film, in the face of pressing problems of our time.

Topics such as reason, freedom, war, exploitation, and racism are discussed in the film by world-famous philosophers and Kantians - Corine Pelluchon, Susan Neiman and Marcus Willaschek. They “accompany” the great thinker on his walks around Königsberg, going to intellectual heights and abysses and becoming key witnesses of the Enlightenment.

2023, Germany, 54 min., 16+