Without this World

Argentina, 2016. In a forgotten corner of the country’s hot northern region there are around 700 ethnic German Mennonites living life as though it were still the eighteenth century. This community speaks Old Low German and lives off the land and by breeding cattle. They use horse carts instead of cars and their only schoolbooks are the Bible and the Catechism. Their religion forbids the use of electricity, telephones or radios. Life, they believe, should not be comfortable. Instead the colony chooses to pursue a way of life that is as pious as possible in the service of God, in the hope that their children will decide to continue on this path. These Mennonites seek to shut out the influence of the ‘world’ as they describe everything outside their religious community. This is also the reason why they moved here from Mexico 18 years ago. But is it possible to deny all forms of progress? Ohne diese Welt observes life in a quietist society caught between isolation and change. (Berlinale)