The Halfmoon Files

Mall Singh’s crackling words are heard as he spoke them into the phonographic funnel on 11th December 1916 in the city of Wünsdorf, near Berlin. Singh was one amongst hundreds of colonial soldiers of the First World War. The recordings were produced as the result of an unique alliance between the military, the scientific community and the entertainment industry. In his experimental search Philip Scheffner follows the traces of these voices to the origin of their recording. Like a memory game – which remains incomplete right until the end – he uncovers pictures and sounds that revive the ghosts of the past. His protagonists’ words intersect along the concentric spirals the story follows.