Luis Rainer
Der 10. Mai (The Tenth of May) was the date in 1940 that Hitler invaded the Low Countries: Belgium, Holland and Luxembourg. Neutral Switzerland, which hadn't experienced a war since the 14th century, hurriedly fortified its borders with battalions of inexperienced soldiers. The panic, confusion and isolated acts of courage which occurred on that fateful day are re-created in this Swiss docudrama. The story is "personalized" by concentrating on a fugitive German soldier (Heinz Reincke) who falls in love with the Swiss girl (Linda Geiser) who shelters him. Produced on a bare-minimum budget, Der 10. Mai is impressive more for its sincerity and raw energy than for its actual cinematic merits.
During his trip to the city, a naïve man from the countryside falls victim to a thief who steals his wallet. Since all his personal documents were in it, he not only looses his money but also his identity. The thief turns out to be a cunning con man, who uses the papers for his criminal schemes. Soon enough, a warrant is issued, and eventually both men – the thief and the innocent guy – are arrested. But since all the red tape of the government causes even more confusion, the odyssey of the victim searching for his lost identity has just started.
Germany in the fall of 1918: Accompanied by the Archduke Karl Maria, Princess Henriette von Battenstein makes an inspection tour of hospitals. During these inspections, she meets Lieutenant Rainer, the former conductor of the State Opera. When she later makes music with him in the Archduke's castle, she becomes the unwilling witness to a secret cease fire negotiation.
The farmers on the Lohhof, the largest farm in the area, are well known all around and have the highest prestige amongst their peers, not the least, because they never suffer any shortage of water. When in times of drought the water everywhere else has dried into nothingness, the water on the Lohhof is abundant and fresh. But one very dry summer, the drought comes to the Lohhof, too, and this time, the source of the water has dried up. And so, with diving rod in hand, one of the farm's old peasants goes on his merry little way to find a new source of water. At one point, the diving rod bends so strongly, that it almost slips out of the old man's hands. Convinced that there must be a huge source of water nearby, all the farmers of the Lohhof bend their backs to find the new well. They dig long, but they dig in vain: no water is found, only a strange sand, which is yellowish, shiny and flickers golden in the sun.
