Hitlers Hollywood

Film journalist and critic Rüdiger Suchsland examines German cinema from 1933, when the Nazis came into power, until 1945, when the Third Reich collapsed. (A sequel to From Caligari to Hitler, 2015.)

Wendegeschichten: Riesa

Der lange Abschied von der Kohle

Heldentod - Der Tunnel und die Lüge

It was the biggest escape in the history of the Berlin Wall: in one historic night of October 1964, 57 East-Berliners try their luck through a tunnel into West Berlin. Just before the last few reach the other side, the East German border guards notice the escape and open fire. Remarkably, all the refugees and their escape agents make it out of the tunnel unscathed, but one border guard is dead: 21-year-old officer Egon Schultz.

Vom Wir zum Ich

In October 1987, the documentary film collective Amber Films from Newcastle became the first British film crew ever allowed to shoot in East Germany. They filmed the workers of the state-owned fishing concern in Warnemünde and a brigade of crane operators at the state Warnow dockyards. Just two years later, East Germany was history, including most of the jobs it once provided. Twenty-five years later, in 2014, the filmmakers returned to an utterly different Rostock. They visited the people they had filmed in 1987. Together, documentarians and subjects look at excerpts from the earlier film, and talk about the enormous changes the men and women experienced, how they dealt with them, and how they feel today.

Ich bin meine eigene Frau

The life story of Charlotte von Mahlsdorf, who survived the Nazi reign as a trans woman and helped start the German gay liberation movement. Documentary with some dramatized scenes. Two actors play the young and middle aged Charlotte and she plays herself in the later years.

Ich will da sein - Jenny Gröllmann

Kelet-nyugati átjáró

In the summer of 1989 tens of thousands of tourists from communist East Germany came to Hungary. They were deeply disillusioned because they felt they had no future in East Germany. There was no freedom, no choice in the shops, salaries were low and they could not travel except to Eastern Europe. They wanted to go to a prosperous and free West Germany but they could not get passports, so they hoped that by travelling through Hungary, the least suppressed country of the Soviet Block, they could cross the Iron Curtain into Austria and then travel on into West Germany. For them the Hungary of twenty years ago was the new east-west passage. Written by Czes

Der rote Elvis

A documentary on the late American entertainer Dean Reed, who became a huge star in East Germany after settling there in 1973.

Paradies der Tiere

On the 160-hectare grounds of the former Friedrichsfelde Palace Park, the Berlin Animal Park was established in the 1950s with the active support of the local population. In 1980, more than 7,800 animals from all continents live here. The film describes the foundation, the construction and the care of the animals in the extensive park.

Großes Kino made in DDR

Das Boot – Welterfolg aus der Tiefe

In 1981, a film about the misadventures of a German U-boat crew in 1941 becomes a worldwide hit almost four decades after the end of the World War II. Millions of viewers worldwide make Das Boot the most internationally successful German film of all time. But due to disputes over the script, accidents on the set, and voices accusing the makers of glorifying the war, the project was many times on the verge of being cancelled.

In Syrien auf Montage

The film is a reportage showing the help of workers from the GDR in the industrial reconstruction of Syria. We witness the friendly relationship between workers from both countries, who are jointly involved in the construction of the cotton spinning mill in Homs. In impressive pictures the exoticism of the environment and the mentality of the Syrian hosts is shown. At the same time it becomes clear that the workers from the GDR become 'ambassadors of the GDR' through their collegial behaviour and good work.

Auf der Oder

Diese Briten, diese Deutschen

This first co-production between the GDR and Great Britain is intended to contribute to an understanding of the situation and attitudes of millions of working people in opposing social orders. Using the example of shipyard workers, fishermen, the brigade and family of a trade union active cook and unemployed person of various ages and professions in Newcastle on the one hand and a brigade of crane operators of the Warnowwerft and fishermen of the Warnemünde cooperative on the other hand, insights into the way of life and attitudes of people of our time are to be conveyed.

Das letzte Finale der DDR – Zwischen Mauerfall und Wiedervereinigung

Ost/​West – Relikte einer Grenze

Bernau liegt am Meer

Daniel lives in Bernau, a small town north of Berlin.This film tells this 21-year-old’s story and describes the radical right-wing milieu in which he grew up. In his candid portrait of how right-wing radicalism breeds, Daniel explains how difficult it is to break out of a vicious circle of violence, self-hatred and a right-wing extremist frame of mind.

Caligari — Wie der Horror ins Kino kam

On February 26, 1920, Robert Wiene's world-famous film The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari premiered at the Marmorhaus in Berlin. To this day, it is considered a manifesto of German expressionism; a legend of cinema and a key work to understand the nature of the Weimar Republic and the constant political turmoil in which a divided society lived after the end of the First World War.

Zeitschleifen - Im Dialog mit Christa Wolf

Journalist Daniela Dahn interviews the East-German author Christa Wolf during the German reunification: reflections on history, changing politics, life and work.