In 1978, director Herrmann Zschoche’s film Seven Freckles was a huge hit. That film told the story of two young lovers meeting and falling in love at a summer camp, where they're cast as Romeo and Juliet in a camp production of Shakespeare’s play. Eleven years later, Zschoche returned to the subject of young love, …
Those “Porcupine” Films (Das Stachetier)
If you’ve read more than a couple of the articles on this blog, you’ll have come across the name “Das Stacheltier.” Formed in 1953 as a subgroup of the documentary film group at DEFA, Das Stacheltier made short films intended to play before the main features at East German cinemas. Stacheltier means porcupine in German1, …
Rivals Behind the Wheel
When one thinks of East German movies, car racing films are not the first things that come to mind, but they did make one. Rivals Behind the Wheel (Rivalen am Steuer) tells the story of a racecar driver who discovers that the world of international car racing is filled with exploitative capitalists, only interested in …
Heroin
The late sixties saw the trend in international intrigue move from the Cold War to the Drug War. It started with the made-for-TV movie The Poppy Is Also a Flower, which was financed by the United Nations in cooperation with the Xerox Corporation, and went through the early 1970s, reaching its apex with William Friedkin’s …
Joachim Hellwig and defa futurum
Even if you are a fan of East German films and have seen nearly everything in the DEFA catalog, you may not be familiar with the name Joachim Hellwig. Hellwig primarily made documentaries. He was a bit of a party wonk and avoided rocking the boat, so you won’t find any of his films on …
Murder on Monday
Germany has given the world plenty of great films and filmmakers, but their greatest contribution to genre cinema is the Krimifilm. Literally, this just means crime film, but the Krimi is much more than that. A good Krimi has a style and structure that started in the silent era, and can still be seen in …
1-2-3 Corona
There’s a tinge of irony in the fact that one of the movies that gave people in Germany a little joy amidst the rubble of World War II has a name that now reminds us of darker times. 1-2-3 Corona might be the most happy-go-lucky film that DEFA ever made. The story takes place in …
What Should I Watch?
New to East German films? Here are a few from DEFA with English subtitles that are well worth seeing. All of these films are currently available on the Kanopy streaming service. I’m often asked for recommendations on East German movies that people should watch. There’s no one answer to this. I once showed my personal …
Do You Know Urban?
While recuperating in the hospital Hoffi (Berndt Renné) meets Urban (Manfred Karge). Urban has worked as an engineer on projects all over the world, and Hoffi sees him as a source of meaningful employment. Hoffi just spent 1½ years in prison on an assault charge, and nobody wants to hire an ex-con. Hoffi hopes to …
Pension Boulanka
A few years back, I was talking to the “Czar of Noir” Eddie Muller. Eddie is the man behind Noir City, a film noir festival held every year at the Castro Theatre here in San Francisco.1 Always on the lookout for new and undiscovered examples of this genre, he asked me if I could recommend …
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