By the end of the sixties, it was obvious to all but the most iron-headed autocrats that East Germany was facing a crisis of culture. In spite of every effort to seal the public off from the invidious influences of the west, information was getting through, and the young people of the GDR were becoming more and more dissatisfied with the state of things. At DEFA they decided to try a different tack. If the kids wanted youth-oriented films that could match the likes of the AIP Beach Party movies, then DEFA was going to give them what they wanted, but with a distinctly communist slant. Thus was born the first East German Beach Party film, Hot Summer (Heißer Sommer).
In Hot Summer, a group of boys from Karl-Marx-Stadt (Chemnitz) and group of girls from Leipzig that have just finished school and are ready for a summer vacation (like its Hollywood counterparts, everyone in this film is considerably older than the character they play). They meet on their way to the Baltic Sea, with each group trading turns singing about the joys of a hot summer. Unlike the American Beach Party movies, which usually start with the boys and girls getting along at first and then fighting later, the boys and girls of Hot Summer are at each other from the start. The boys are led by Kai, played by the popular East German singer, Frank Schöbel, and the girls are led by Stupsi, played by Chris Doerk, a tomboy with a 100-watt smile and a voice that could have knocked down the wall by itself.
By the time Hot Summer was made, Chris Doerk and Frank Schöbel—a married couple in real life—were already media darlings in East Germany. Both appeared regularly on TV variety shows. Although there is some sexual tension between Kai and Stupsi, it never amounts to much. Aside from a scene where the two of them are singing atop a railroad train and then jump into a haystack (done without stunt doubles, I might add), they never quite connect. Kai has the hots for Stupsi’s pal, Britt, a flirtatious young woman who wants to have it all—in this case, all meaning both Kai and his friend Wolf.
In a Hollywood film, Britt would be the bad girl, who learns the hard way that living for the moment has its consequences (see Yvette Mimieux’s character in Where the Boys Are for the classic example of this). She would be chastised because sex for its own enjoyment is seen as a bad thing. In the east, her behavior is frowned on because it leads to party disunity. The rivalry over Britt threatens to tear the fabric of the community apart and everyone learns that the needs of the collective are more important than the needs of the individual. Britt is played by Regine Albrecht, who exudes a an easy-going, inconsiderate charm. Ms. Albrecht was primarily a stage actress, but she appeared in several films in the GDR. Since the late nineties, she has worked with the Hans Otto Theater in Potsdam, where she lives. She is also well-known for her voice dubbing, and has done the German voices for several popular American television shows and movies, including The Gilmore Girls, and Brokeback Mountain.
The director, Joachim Hasler, who was already a well-respected cinematographer when he made this film. After serving an apprenticeship at the ORWO labs in Wolfen (then still called AGFA), he became an apprentice cameraman at DEFA, working under the famous Bruno Mondi (see Rotation for more information on Mondi). His first screen credit as cinematographer was on Martin Hellberg’s anti-American classic, Das verurteilte Dorf (The Condemned Village). From there he went on to film some of the best DEFA movies of the late fifties and early sixties, including The Silent Star, and Das Lied der Matrosen (The Sailor’s Song). He began directing films in 1957, starting with Gejagt bis zum Morgen (Hunted Until Morning), and he scored a big hit in 1965 with Chronik eines Mordes (The Story of a Murder), which starred Angelica Domröse of The Legend of Paul and Paula fame.
The term auteur is often bandied about in film criticism and suggests that the director is the driving creative force behind a movie. Auteur theory falls to pieces in the east, where that kind of project ownership was actively discouraged. But Hot Summer comes closer to fitting the concept than most DEFA films. Joachim Hasler not only directed the film, but—like Kubrick and Soderberg—he was also the cinematographer and the co-author of the screenplay.
In spite of this seemingly heavy message, Hot Summer is light fun. The cast is as attractive as any western equivalent, and the songs are ridiculously catchy. After a couple listenings, you’ll find yourself humming them for the rest of the day. [Note: in German, they call a song that gets stuck in your head an Ohrwurm—literally, an “ear worm.”] The music was composed by the father and son team of Gerd and Thomas Natschinski. Gerd got his start after WWII as the conductor of the radio orchestra in Leipzig (Große Unterhaltungsorchester des Leipziger Rundfunks). He studied with Hanns Eisler in Berlin and also conducted the Berlin Radio Orchestra (Berliner Rundfunk). He began by scoring short films, and moved to feature films in 1954 with Hexen and Carola Lamberti – Eine vom Zirkus. He composed several theater pieces, including the musical Mein Freund Bunbury (My Friend Bunbury), and a ballet version of The Tales of Hoffmann. He also composed the music for Meine Frau macht Musik (My Wife Wants to Sing), and Revue um Mitternacht (Midnight Revue)—two of DEFA’s most successful musicals.
Gerd knew how to compose classical and stage music but Hot Summer was more pop than anything he had done before. To help him with this, he enlisted the aid of his 21-year-old son Thomas. The younger Natschinski was already a successful rock musician in East Germany, whose band, Team 4, had scored a hit in 1964 with “Mokka-Milch-Eisbar,” an extremely popular (and catchy) song about the joys of an ice cream parlor on East Berlin’s Karl-Marx-Allee. From there he went on to lead or work with several other groups, including Karat and Veronika Fischer (see DEFA Disko 77). In the late seventies, he started composing music for East German television shows, and continued this after the wall came down with nary a pause. In 2008, he published his biography (co-written with journalist, Christine Dähn), Verdammt, wer hat das Klavier erfunden (Damn it, Who Invented the Piano).
Hot Summer was a hit at the box-office. In the west, this would have led to an immediate sequel or two (in the case of Beach Party, three sequels were made in the following year alone). But the GDR didn’t work that way. It took five years for anything resembling a sequel to this film to make it to the big screen. In 1975, Joachim Hasler got together a second time with Doerk and Schöbel to create Nicht schummeln, Liebling! (No Cheating, Darling!), a film about the battle of the sexes and soccer. The film was not the hit that Hot Summer was. Critics liked the music, but hated the movie. It was Hasler’s last film as a cinematographer, but he continued to direct films for the next few years, including the popular TV-movie, Ein Engel im Taxi (An Angel in a Taxi), and Der Mann mit dem Ring im Ohr (The Man with the Ring in His Ear).
Today, the comparison to the films of Frankie and Annette has faded. More often, the film is compared to Grease, even though Grease came out after Hot Summer (the play in 1971, and the film in 1978). Nonetheless, it is an apt comparison. Both Grease and Hot Summer were dismissed by critics as pop culture kitsch appealing only to the lowest common denominator, yet both were box office hits that transcended the criticism with an infectious exuberance and plenty of catchy songs. Both have experienced revivals, of sorts. While Grease continues to enjoy repertory theater screenings and road shows of its theatrical version (as well as the occasional movie-house sing-along), Hot Summer went the opposite route, starting as a film and migrating to the stage in Rostock and Grünau. It is easy to sniff at a fluffy little film like Hot Summer, but it is far more enjoyable to simply let yourself go with it and accept it for what it was intended to be: a welcome relief from the drab duties of daily life.
