Alexander Scheer
Berlin in the 1920’s. A dazzling place, but times are not only golden, they are marked by poverty and crime. Vicky arrives in the city, led by promises of a better life, she’s looking for a job. But as soon as she gets there, her hopes and dreams are met with a cold awakening. With no place to stay and nothing to her name, she hires on to work as a saleswoman at a newly-established, glamorous department store. But the founders are also fighting for survival, just like Vicky. Times are tough, and it’s about to get tougher.
When 22-year-old Rainer Werner Fassbinder storms the stage of a small, progressive theatre in Munich 1967, and seizes the production without further ado, nobody suspects this brazen young rebel to become one of the most important post-war German filmmakers. Despite early setbacks, many of his films breakout at the most renowned films festivals and polarise audience, critics and filmmakers alike. His radical views and self-exploitation, as well as his longing for love, have made him one of the most fascinating film directors of this time.
In the aftermath of World War II, a British colonel and his wife are assigned to live in Hamburg during the post-war reconstruction, but tensions arise with the German widower who lives with them.
The real life story of East German singer and writer Gerhard Gundermann and his struggles with music, life as a coal miner and his dealings with the secret police (STASI) of the GDR.
Volksbühne am Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz 1992-2017. The end of the GDR gave rise to new artistic freedoms in reunited Berlin. Shortly after the fall of the Wall, rebel director Frank Castorf was appointed artistic director of the Volksbühne. His way of working altered the public’s perception of this theater. The chronological history of the Castorf era between 1992 and 2017 is told here in excerpts from the productions and in a series of conversations conducted on the long sofa in the theater's foyer.
Acclaimed series based on the true story of an unprecedented hostage crisis which shocked Germany in the summer of 1988.
Nobody captured the atmosphere of 1990s Berlin better than German photographer Daniel Josefsohn, who died in 2016 at the age of 54, leaving his mark in advertising with his irreverent aesthetic and punk sensibility. It was his spontaneous, imperfect images shot for an MTV campaign in 1994 that first made him famous.
With a t-shirt sale the two friends Günther and Wolfgang finally want to turn their backs on unemployment benefits. But this plan is not as easy to implement as expected and in the end, almost everything is different than it initially looks. But one thing is certain: there is always time of a Schnitzel.
26 year-old Karl Marx embarks with his wife, Jenny, on the road to exile. In 1844 in Paris, he meets Friedrich Engels, an industrialist’s son, who has been investigating the sordid birth of the British working class. Engels, the dandy, provides the last piece of the puzzle to the young Karl Marx’s new vision of the world. Together, between censorship and the police’s repression, riots and political upheavals, they will lead the labor movement during its development into a modern era.
Thrust into an all-new adventure, a down-on-his-luck Capt. Jack Sparrow feels the winds of ill-fortune blowing even more strongly when deadly ghost sailors led by his old nemesis, the evil Capt. Salazar, escape from the Devil's Triangle. Jack's only hope of survival lies in seeking out the legendary Trident of Poseidon, but to find it, he must forge an uneasy alliance with a brilliant and beautiful astronomer and a headstrong young man in the British navy.
Mirko Talhammer is beyond himself when two strange guys show up in his noble insurance office and remind him where he really comes from: from a scrapyard in the provinces, where careers are not what counts, other things are more important: scrapping things, the family, and every once in a while, a nice fist fight. Mirko left all that behind, but his father messes things up big time when he dies and leaves his son the run down scrapyard - together with his brother Letscho. And Letscho is still ticked off that Mirko deserted the clan. But soon the brothers realize that the Talhammers only have a future if they can pull themselves together and fulfill their father's last wish: to rob a train like real professionals! The coup itself is like a suicide mission, but then Kercher, the Talhammer's biggest nemesis, gets wind of things...
While his mother is in rehab and his father is on a 'business trip' with his assistant, 14-year-old outsider Maik is spending the summer holidays bored and alone at his parents' villa, when rebellious teenager Tschick appears. Tschick, a Russian immigrant and an outcast, steals a car and decides to set off on a journey away from Berlin with Maik tagging along for the ride. So begins a wild adventure where the two experience the trip of a lifetime and share a summer that they will never forget.
After several strokes of fate ends a rage eruption of the otherwise so quiet power engineering technician Felix Grünler with a criminal complaint for assault. A grateful affair for his sister-in-law Karin, who forges an intrigue to gain the inheritance of her mother-in-law. She succeeds in having Felix admitted to psychiatry as incompetent. He is determined not to get into therapy. For doctors, this confirms the picture of the labile patient. But in the other patients Felix gives his consistent anti-attitude in the long run benevolent recognition.
An overwhelmed family man (Bastian Pastewka) starts to produce counterfeit money in his own run down print shop.
Lou Andreas-Salomé, the woman who enraptured 19th century Europe’s greatest minds, recounts her life to Ernst Pfeiffer in this German film directed by Cordula Kablitz-Post. A published novelist, poet and essayist, Salomé’s desire to live a life free from convention scandalized society but spurred genius and passion in others, including Friedrich Nietzsche, Paul Rée and her lover, the poet Rainer Maria Rilke. Under the tutelage of Sigmund Freud, she became the first female psychoanalyst.
In his new case, Marthaler is puzzled. A bachelor party ended with a cruel bloody act. While the investigations lead Marthaler to France, there are more murders in Frankfurt. Marthaler and his team soon chase after a beautiful stranger, who seems to be the key to solving the case. Continuation of the successful series with Frankfurt Chief Commissioner Robert Marthaler, based on novel works by Jan Seghers.
1980: 19 year old Robert, fed up with Hippy phoniness and bourgeoise narrow mindedness alike, flees the German provinces for West Berlin. A tour de force through the glorious dirt of West Berlin ensues. Full of sex, drugs, love and PUNK.
It's summer. One endless, sexy party under the open sky. Tina and her friends are living the dream of a whole generation of decadent Berlin-party-kids. But after one excessive night she's haunted by a mysterious ugly creature in nightmares she has. The only person she talks about her fears to is her psychologist. His advice is to confront her fears and to reach out to the creature. At first Tina refuses but after she hears about her parents' plans to put her in a mental hospital she starts talking to the creature. She slowly realizes that the creature is an incarnation of her fears and that it has the same feelings she does. Afraid of being called a freak she starts hiding the creature in her room. After a while she even gets close to it. It's almost like a relationship with a wild stray animal. For the first time in her life, it almost seems as if Tina has the courage to be herself. But then her parents and her friends see the creature…
East Germany. Summer, late 70's. Three years after her boyfriend Wassilij's apparent death, Nelly Senff decides to escape from behind the Berlin wall with her son Alexej, leaving her traumatic memories and past behind. Pretending to marry a West German, she crosses the border to start a new life in the West. But soon her past starts to haunt her as the Allied Secret Service begin to question Wassilij's mysterious disappearance. Is he still alive? Was he a spy? Plagued by her past and fraught with paranoia, Nelly is forced to choose between discovering the truth about her former lover and her hopes for a better tomorrow.
The two friends Nora and Isabel, both disabled, try to lead normal lives. Strangely enough, it is their family, well-meaning friends and care workers who appear not to want normality at all. When Nora decides to marry her immigrant lover Amadou, her family does everything in its power to stop her.
Christmas is just two weeks away, it is pouring with rain, and Ben is struggling to get into the Christmas spirit. Suddenly, Bens life takes a turn for the better when Santa Niklas Goodfellow and his Christmas caravan come crashing down to Earth in the middle of thunderstorm and land in Foggy Lane. Santa is on the run from the ruthless Gerold Geronimus Goblynch and his army of nutcrackers who have outlawed all of the old magical ways and have transformed the bright and peaceful Christmas world into a dark and hostile place, governed by greed and money. Goblynch has banned work for all Santas and confined the Christmas angels to tiny prison cells, where they can no longer hear the dearest wishes of children. Goblynch also wants to force Santa Niklas Goodfellow, the last real Santa, to work for his commercialized Christmas company and forces him to do hard labour in the ordering department of the Christmas Palace.
Hanna and Simon are in a 20 year marriage with an unexiting relationship. By chance, they both meet and start separate affairs with Adam. Adam has no idea that his two lovers are married, until they are all found out when Hanna becomes pregnant, with the natural doubts stemming from their situation.
A German flight attendant's life spirals downward after she leaves her husband, quits her job, and joins a radical group of animal rights activists.
The era of the feared sea pirates Klaus Störtebeker and Gödeke Michels is coming to an end. After a long period with no booty at last a bulging ship appears on the horizon. However, Störtebeker is badly wounded in the attempted capture and the pirates suffer ignominious defeat. Not only their ship is down the drain - Störtebeker himself is suddenly plagued by anxiety and doubt about his very existence as a pirate. He is drawn to the beautiful country girl Bille, while Michels gets rebuffed by the friesian princess Okka. In the very moment that the crew have mutinied and co-captain Michels is literally at the end of his tether, they discover on board their ramshackle old tub a most unique wonder weapon. Glory days are quickly revived - until the mighty Hanse consolidate their power and weaponry and go to war against the pirates. Störtebeker and Michels are forced to decide: To live as a farmer or to die as a pirate.
Amira, an aspiring young dancer, is cast out of her uncle's home in Tangiers when she refuses to either get married or become a housemaid. She finds refuge in the apartment of some girlfriends who earn their living as prostitutes. Pia and Tom, a young German couple, have come to Morocco seeking musical inspiration. When they meet her in a nightclub, Amira's sensual dancing inspires the thought of a potential love triangle that might help stimulate Pia's stagnant relationship with Tom. Amira, with ulterior motives, embraces the idea of an affair with Tom, hoping this might provide an opportunity to change her fate.
My foreign subsidiary: TV-drama about a retired civil servants (Götz George) who wins a new relationship with his unloved son by the sudden death of his daughter.
Based on a true story, MRS RATCLIFFE'S REVOLUTION, is the tale of a family from Bingley in Yorkshire, who defect to East Germany. Here they find a nightmare of rationing, censorship and the most spied upon people in history rather than the Marxist utopia they were expecting. But if they thought getting in was difficult wait until they try to get out.
Achim Bornhak's movie focuses on the restless life of Uschi Obermaier, the icon of the 1968 movement in Germany and groupie. At the age of 16, Uschi is bored by her job in a photo lab, but soon becomes the "it girl" of Munich's club scene. When she gets to know Rainer Langhans, they move to Berlin and live in "Kommune 1", the first politically-motivated commune in Germany. While the other occupants claim she isn't political enough, Uschi just wants to have fun, works as fashion model and leads international music stars in temptation.
Berlin, Berlin is a television series produced for the ARD. It aired in Germany from 2002 to 2005 Tuesdays through Fridays at 6:50PM on the German public TV network Das Erste. The show won both national and international awards.
Josh is about to turn 30; he's mentally retarded, and likes to play at being a vampire. His sister Nicole is 15, and dealing with her impending womanhood; middle brother Mike is the "normal" one, but in some ways the most childish - his latest conquest is Nadine, who runs the dog kennel at his security guard job. Nic is fixated on getting laid, and watches Mike and Nadine through the skylight with Josh. Josh also gets fixated on sex, though he has no clear idea what it's all about, and in particular on Nadine; to Mike's chagrin, she seems more interested in Josh than in him.
Edward Kaminsky, an aging ad man, wants a golden parachute from his agency; he must first land the Opel auto contract. Rosa, a youth with wealthy parents, wants to establish herself as an artist. The clumsy and enthusiastic Viktor, not quite honest, wants work. When he wanders into Kaminsky's meeting with Opel and says something about irony, the Opel director wants him in on the campaign. Then he steals an idea from Rosa that the Opel director loves. Before Rosa discovers he's expropriated her idea, Rosa and Viktor become lovers. Father-son feelings materialize between Kaminsky and Viktor. Can the impulsive Viktor hold it together before Rosa learns the truth and flies away?
A group of kids grow up on the short, wrong (east) side of the Sonnenallee in Berlin, right next to one of the few border crossings between East and West reserved for German citizens. The antics of these kids, their families, of the "West German" friends and relatives who come to visit, and of the East German border guards, all serve to illustrate the absurdity of everyday life on the Sonnenallee, and therefore throughout the former East Germany.
During World War I, a group of women who are left behind in an English farming community become romantically involved with several German prisoners of war.
The true story of an operation which was a revolution, not only for the world of medicine. Frankfurt 1967. A young doctor called Lisa Scheel is trying to get a foothold in the male-dominated world of transplant surgery. But after she is passed over by her main professor in favour of a male applicant, on the spur of the moment Lisa heads off to Cape Town. Here, she starts work for Dr. Barnaard, who, like his colleagues in Frankfurt, is planning a heart transplantation. Together with the surgeon Hamilton Naki, who due to apartheid can only join the team secretly, Lisa is a major contributor to the first heart transplant in history.
