Hannes Fischer

Ernst Schneller

The movie begins by showing how Schneller takes up the profession of a teacher out of love for the children. When the First World War begins, he becomes a 'volunteer officer' and slowly the political situation begins to shape him. He develops into a revolutionary fighter.

Fog

At the beginning of the 1960s, a German turns up on behalf of the NATO in the British village of Rocksmouth. NATO wants to establish a naval base in Rocksmouth, but first, the German envoy has to salvage an old ship wreck. In 1942, the "Princess of India" was supposed to bring children to safety in Canada but was sunk by a German submarine at departure. 58 people were killed, most of them children.

Der Streit um den Sergeanten Grischa

Russian soldier Grisha escapes from a German prisoner-of-war camp in the spring of 1917. He is caught and is to be shot as a spy. This decision is controversial. The dispute continues. Grisha is executed on the orders of the army high command.

Artur Becker

Artur Becker, who, as a young communist during the Weimar Republic, faced his first major test during the Kapp Putsch, fought against Franco’s coup plotters during the Spanish Civil War, was seriously wounded, and arrested. After a failed escape attempt and numerous interrogations by Spanish and German coup plotters, he was eventually shot.

Duped Till Doomsday

East Germany's contribution to the 1957 Cannes Film Festival was the wartime melodrama Betrogen bis zum Juengsten Tag. Had the film been released in the U.S., the title would probably have translated to Duped Till the Last. The film condemns the Nazi mindset by concentrating on a particularly odious cover-up. When his son is involved in the accidental killing of a girl, a Gestapo general pulls strings to save the boy from prosecution. The general manages to pin the blame for the killing on a group of Russians, whereupon he gives the men under his command carte blanche to round up and execute as many innocent Russians as they wish. This act of brutality is contrasted with the pangs of guilt suffered by the son and his co-conspirators.

Meines Vaters Straßenbahn

Ralph grows up in pre-war Dresden as the eldest son of a principled and orderly streetcar conductor. With the rise to power of the Nazis, the war, the collapse and the hesitant new beginning, his firmly established middle-class world is also thrown off course. His father is one of the first to be called up to the front. His mother is left alone with the responsibility for Ralph and his younger brother Achim. In the air-raid shelter, during the nights of bombing and later in the daily struggle against misery and hunger, the mother quickly abandons all moral baggage and develops a pragmatic will to survive, for which she admires Ralph. At the same time, the boy is frightened by his mother's desperate claim to happiness because he perceives her affairs as a betrayal of his father, who has gradually faded into a symbol of a happy, carefree childhood.

Millowitsch Theater - Adel verpflichtet zu nichts

The Song of the Trumpeter

Fritz Weineck, a worker′s son from Halle, loves music – and dreams to make a living out of it one day. When his friend Alfons, a World War I veteran, gives him a trumpet as a gift, Fritz seems to come closer to fulfil his dream. But then, Fritz realizes that after the end of the German empire workers still have to desperately fight for their rights, and decides to use his instrument for political means: At a meeting of militant workers, he uses his trumpet as a signal horn. But Fritz suffers a severe setback when a comrade dies in the fight for an arms depot because of his fault.

The Farmer's Clever Daughter

A farmer receives land from the king and discovers a buried golden mortar. He decides to give it to the king out of gratitude, but his clever daughter warns him that the king will surely want him to bring a corresponding pestle as well. When the king throws the farmer into jail for fraud, he bemoans the fact that he did not listen to his daughter.

Aus dem Leben eines Taugenichts

Screen adaptation of Eichendorff's famous novella. A penniless drifter roams the land with his violin and preferably sings his songs to beautiful women. Two of his female admirers get him employed as a gardener at a castle. Yet he doesn't settle down for long, and moves on to his next temporary job as a customs officer. Finally, he travels to Italy where he joins the gang of Rinaldo Rinaldini and eventually meets the love of his life.

Einer muß die Leiche sein

A group of tourists from the GDR spend their holiday at the coast of Bulgaria. When making a trip to a small fisher house, they have to stay they night, because the ship's motor broke down. One of the group proposes a game: Someone has to be a corpse, one the detective and another one the murderer. But shortly after starting the game the "corpse" has vanished only to befound at the foot of the nearby cliff - being dead for real. Now the group start their investigation...

Jetzt und in der Stunde meines Todes

Ella Conradi, a dedicated journalist from Germany, is in Jerusalem to report about the trial against the Nazi criminal Eichmann. Disgusted by the monstrosities that are revealed, she eventually returns to Germany. There, she wants to cover common cases and trials again. Her first assignment is a murder trial against a man called Ralf Jordan who constantly maintains his innocence. Conradi, who believes Jordan and wants to help him, starts to investigate the case - and thus opens up a political can of worms. The backgrounds of the case reach back to the Nazi period and involve officials of the Third Reich, who in the meantime have returned to their powerful positions.

A Lord of Alexander Square

Ewald Honig can't break his bad habit. Hardly has he crossed over into the GDR when the strapping, well-built man in his late fifties once again starts courting ladies with fraudulent intentions. His daughter Ina, burdened with the same genes, specializes in married men in their prime. Two criminologists are on the Honigs' trail, but they soon have enough to handle just dealing with each other. Meanwhile, Honig and his daughter have left their wayward path of their own accord.

Zünd an, es kommt die Feuerwehr

A morality tale from the time of the Saxon Kingdom. The von Siebenthal volunteer fire department has nothing to do. When their local pub is in a very dilapidated state, but the landlord has no money to renovate it, the fire department tries to help out by setting fire to it themselves, but it doesn't quite work. They look for a new object to set fire to, the supposedly empty prison. But there is only one prisoner, who is heroically rescued by Captain Kaden.

Hochmut kommt vor dem Knall

Under political pressure, a West German radio station stages a radio play about a Russian invasion of West Germany. A handsome fee convinced the unemployed Anton Wiesel to take on the direction. At the same time, the driver Harry Kyritz received an inheritance: a decrepit barge with which he intends to become an entrepreneur. His acquaintance with Madeleine Müller, the daughter of a coal wholesaler, comes at just the right time. But so does Mr. Müller, because he is broke. So he throws a big party to sell his daughter as his last profitable asset. Harry has a good chance when the radio plays a radio play about a Russian robbery. The guests take it as a factual report and flee to the cellar. Harry reveals his true financial situation, but Müller accepts him anyway - as a model worker for the Russians. But when the mistake is revealed, Harry is out of the running in favor of a wealthier son-in-law.