settima

Berlin

Menschen am Sonntag [People on Sunday, a Film Without Actors] (Robert Siodmak, Edgar G. Ulmer, Rochus Gliese, Curt Siodmak + Fred Zinnemann, 1929)

Jul

31

Menschen am Sonntag (1929)

Brigitte Borchert savours her Sunday. The workweek is still lightyears away (via). DP: Eugen Schüfftan.

Someone goes to work*

“Du, Wolf, nächsten Sonntag — ?”

– title card

Berliners rest on Sunday, we still do. People lounge in the many parks, and on the shores of the city's many lakes. And then, it's Monday.

 

Released in 1929, according to Atlas Film, who restored this important Weimar classic long before Criterion put their grubby hands on it.

 

Bildnis einer Trinkerin – Aller jamais retour [Portrait of a Female Drunkard. Ticket of No Return] (Ulrike Ottinger, 1979)

Jul

15

Bildnis einer Trinkerin( (1979)

Sie, German for “She”, hungover in her fabulous yellow nappa leather outfit (via). DP: Ulrike Ottinger.

Someone is hungover*

“Ein Psychogramm zweier ungewöhnlicher, aber auch extrem unterschiedlicher Frauen. Die eine, reich, exzentrisch, ihre Gefühle maskenhaft verbergend, trinkt sich bewusst zu Tode. Sie ist der Fall, der in der Statistik nicht erscheint, weil entweder zu Hause unter Valium gehalten oder unter Verschluss in einer Privatklinik. Die andere ist arm und trinkt sich unbewusst zu Tode. Sie erscheint in der normalen Statistik als Typ der haltlosen Trinkerin”

– U.O., via

An eccentric woman simply named Sie (Tabea Blumenschein), takes a one-way trip to West Berlin. Accompanied by her alter ego, a homeless alcoholic, and commented on by a Greek choir consisting of Soziale Frage (Social Question), Exakte Statistik (Exact Statistics), and Gesunder Menschenverstand (Common Sense), she drinks herself to death.

 

Die endlose Nacht [The Endless Night] (Will Tremper, 1963)

Jul

6

Die endlose Nacht (1963)

The bold and the beautiful stuck at Tempelhof. And yes, one could smoke there. DP: Hans Jura.

(People at) an airport*

 

It's foggy at Flughafen Berlin-Tempelhof, the Allies' airbridge to the West, and all the planes into and out of West Berlin are grounded. In any other metropolis this could mean taking a train, enjoy the city's nightlife or maybe just a bed for the night. In post-Wall bureaucracy-happy West Berlin, this means endless waits with strangers. And so, with nowhere to go, a Polish jazz band mingles with British spouses, a lonely South African farmer, a model and her beau.

 

Ich bin meine eigene Frau [I Am My Own Woman] (Rosa von Praunheim, 1992)

May

16

Honor Our LGBT Elders Day

Ich bin meine eigene Frau (1992)

Ichgola Androgyn, Jens Taschner, and Charlotte von Mahlsdorf as Charlotte von Mahlsdorf. DP: Lorenz Haarmann.

An LGBTQ actor, director, or character over 55 for Honor Our LGBT Elders Day (USA)

“Ich bin meine eigene Frau” (“I am my own woman/wife”)

– Charlotte von Mahlsdorf, in response to her mother's request to settle and get married

The extraordinary life of Charlotte von Mahlsdorf, Berliner, gender bender, Nazi killer (her own father, with a wooden rolling pin, mind you), prisoner, custodian, museum founder, barmaid, Stasi informer (arguably), den mother to the GDR's LGBT+ youngsters, but most of all, her own woman.

Kuhle Wampe oder: Wem gehört die Welt? [Kuhle Wampe or Who Owns the World?] (Slatan Dudow, 1932)

Feb

28

unemployment

Kuhle Wampe oder: Wem gehört die Welt? (1932)

The unemployed at Kuhle Wampe, with Hertha Thiele's Anni front and center. People's states vary between still clinging on to better times up to destitute. DP: Günther Krampf.

Someone quits something or is unemployed: the abdication of Pope Benedict XVI in 2013.

“[Kuhle Wampe] gives witness to the true face of a struggling, suffering nation. Made by four thousand unemployed people, it never aims to be a work of art but simply aims to portray […] workers whose youthful energy is going to waste.”

– Marcel Carné, via

Kuhle Wampe, Berlin slang that means something like “empty stomach”, is the name of a real-world, improvised encampment for the unemployed at the Müggelsee. Here we find a family who lost everything after the death of one of them.

 

This late-Weimar, brechtian film was quickly banned by the German government.

KIPHO [Du musst zur KIPHO] (Julius Pinschewer, 1925)

Sep

25

1925

KIPHO (1925)

A very modern dressed woman with a small film camera. Superimposed but suggested she's filming it, a large teddybear – a bear is #Berlin's official mascot – to remind viewers that the Kino und Photoausstellung [“Film and Photo Fair”) takes place in the German capital. DP: Guido Seeber.

Nasser Asphalt [Wet Asphalt] (Frank Wisbar, 1958)

Dec

20

National Greg Day

Nasser Asphalt (1958)

Greg Bachmann (Horst Buchholz) walking the rainy streets of Berlin. The scene is a direct reference to Dennis Stock's 1955 portrait of James Dean. DP: Helmuth Ashley.

Someone named Greg for National Greg Day (USA)

“Sie können sich einen anderen Beruf aussuchen. Sie sind ein toter Mann.”

Tätowierung [Tattoo / The Delinquent] (Johannes Schaaf, 1967)

Nov

18

National Adoption Day

Tätowierung (1967)

Benno (Christof Wackernagel), a pensive young man with dark hair and dark eyes. DPs: Petrus R. Schlömp & Wolf Wirth.

16 year old Benno (Christof Wackernagel) lives in a reformatory until the Lohmanns, a rich middle-aged #WestBerlin business couple decides to adopt him. A new world opens up, one of adulthood and responsibility. For the teenager, this neatly regulated new bourgeois life feels all wrong.

Stroszek (Werner Herzog, 1977)

Sep

9

German Language Day

Stroszek (1977)

A warm Railroad Flats, Wis. “Willcomen” [sic] for (LtR) Scheitz, Eva, and Bruno, with Mr Scheitz's nephew (Clayton Szalpinski) squeezed between his “Onkellein” and Eva. DP: Thomas Mauch.

Bruno Stroszek (Bruno S.), his friends Eva (Eva Mattes) and Scheitz (Clemens Scheitz, responsible for the fairy-tale music you hear in this film) decide to leave dreary #Berlin behind and move to #Wisconsin where the latter's nephew lives. A new life, with dreams of music and animal magnetism, awaits them there.

“Was ist loos? Der Hund is loose.”

– Clayton

As so oft with #Herzog, the story behind Stroszek is as engrossing as the resulting film. Documentary maker Errol Morris and Herzog were fascinated by Wisconsin's own Ed Gein and wondered if Gein had dug up his own mother, as was rumoured at the time. As they would, they decided to open the poor woman's grave. Morris never showed up, and neither did Herzog but only because his car broke down en route to Plainfield, Wisconsin. Trying to get the vehicle fixed, Herzog entered the workshop of a Clayton Szalpinski.

 

A character in his own right, and a non-actor to boot, Clayton ended up in Stroszek as Scheitz's nephew; a MacGuffin odder than a dancing chicken.

Nicht der Homosexuelle ist pervers, sondern die Situation, in der er lebt [It Is Not the Homosexual Who Is Perverse, But the Society in Which He Lives] (Rosa von Praunheim, 1971)

Jul

6

National Daniel Day

Nicht der Homosexuelle ist pervers, sondern die Situation, in der er lebt (1971)

A gay couple kissing on the street in front of a black-tiled Berlin bar. A third gay man nearby looks away. DP: Robert van Ackeren.

Daniel (Bernd Feuerhelm) is a young man in #WestBerlin exploring his homosexuality. Initially he opts for a spießbürgerlich, petit-bourgeois, almost heterosexual affair. He then probes further, swings by Berlin's public toilets and pools. Only when he encounters a leftwing gay commune he finds that pride, not conformity, is his way of living his life.

“Werdet stolz auf eure Homosexualität! Raus aus den Toiletten, rein in die Strassen! Freiheit für die Schwulen!”

Von Praunheim's Nicht der Homosexuelle ist pervers is a plea for rebellion and visibility. For revolt and love. A wakeup call for gays and straights alike. Such a stir this film pamphlet made it became the blueprint for West-Germany's gay liberation movement.