A knife in his pocket, adrenaline in his blood and a dream in his head: to be a gangster, and the biggest one ever. Yehya was 15 and close to his dream when filmmaker Christian Stahl met him in the stairwell. Yehya was not only the nice neighbor boy, but also “Boss from Sonnenallee” – one of the gangster runners in Berlin-Neukölln. And gangster runners want to have gangster careers. In the eyes of the authorities he was an “intensive offender” and in his own eyes he was “one of the top 10 in Neukölln. I have my own public prosecutor!”

Yehya, son of Palestinian refugees from Lebanon, Rütli student with straight A’s – and prisoner. At 17, Yehya is sentenced to 3 years without parole after a robbery.

The director Christian Stahl accompanies Yehya through the years in prison and, at the same time, his family in Neukölln. The viewer is there when Yehya’s view of the world and gangsters shakes, he quickly rises again in the prison hierarchy, turns to Islam and suddenly becomes a victim himself in prison.

His father tries to solve the family problems with a pilgrimage to Mecca, Yehya’s brothers follow in his footsteps, the state wants to deport Yehya or send him back to the refugee camp in Beirut. His parents, who were refugees in Germany and were not allowed to work for 14 years and remained in their world, despair.

Gangster Runner paints an impressive portrait of an “intense offender” whose charm, criminal energy and ability to reflect amaze and shock. Between Muslim tradition and gangster dreams, macho image and mosque, the omnipresent war in the parents’ foreign homeland and survival in Europe. The film takes the viewer into the world around which the integration debate revolves, without getting involved in this world.

Gangster Runner gets close – and shows what it can mean to want to be the best.

Director: Christian Stahl
Script: Christian Stahl
Camera: Ralf Ilgenfritz
Editing: Johannes Fritsche, Gines Olivares
Music: Tilmann Dehnhard
Sound: Matthias Kreitschmann
Editorial Staff: Søren Schumann, rbb/ARTE; Burkhard Althoff, ZDF Das kleine Fernsehspiel; Manuela Jödicke, rbb
Production: Gunter Hanfgarn, Andrea Ufer
Stations: rbb/ARTE, ZDF Das kleine Fernsehspiel
Funding: FFA

Max-Ophüls-Preis, Filmfestival Saarbrücken, 2011
New Berlin Film Award, Achtung Berlin, 2011
Semaine de la critique, Filmfestival Locarno (Schweiz), 2011
Doclisboa, Lissabon (Portugal), 2011
PRIX EUROPA, Lobende Erwahnung in der Kategorie IRIS, 2011
Festival des Deutschen Films, Paris (Frankreich), 2011
Göteborg International Film Festival (Schweden), 2012
Bester Dokumentarfilm, Internationales Filmwochenende Würzburg, 2012