Europa - Ein Kontinent als Beute

For decades, the promise of peace and growing prosperity held Europeans together between Finland and Cyprus. But since the outbreak of the financial crisis in 2008, the European project has been on a roll. Neo-liberal economic concepts, corrupt elites and globally operating banks and corporations are increasingly dividing the continent; labour rights and social standards are being softened more and more; genocide, class struggles and nationalism are spreading and driving more and more people into the hands of right-wing populists. "Europe - a continent as prey" poses important questions: How did this broad economic, political, cultural and moral crisis in Europe come about - and how do we get out of this fire-dangerous situation? How can we win people over to a fair and solidary Europe? How do we want to live together in Europe in the future? To trace the economic interdependencies and political causes of the crisis, filmmakers Christoph Schuch and Reiner Krausz set out on a journey through Europe: to the crisis-ridden countries of Spain and Portugal, to the European Parliament in Brussels, to the banking metropolis of Frankfurt and to neutral Switzerland. They let the left-wing European politician Fabio De Masi have his say, the economist Dirk Müller aka "Mister Dax" and the historian Daniele Ganser, but also the political activists Paula Gil, Teresa Galindo and Miguel Angel Ferris, who tell of unequal opportunities, the struggle for alternatives worth living for and small hopes. Schuch and Krausz skillfully interweave these diverse expert perspectives with a somnambulistically whirring, sometimes stirring soundtrack by Oliver Augst and Marcel Daemgen and calm, poetic images of a Europe in a state of emergency.