PROJECTING ON THE WALL

CINEMA TELLS THE PERSONAL STORIES AND COLLECTIVE EXPERIENCES OF DIVIDED BERLIN AND A DIVIDED NATION

Projecting on the Wall looks at divided Berlin and Germany’s unique cinema legacy: the films of two Germanys and of the Cold War divided world that since the 1950s have addressed the political, public and personal dimension of living side-by-side, but also apart, in East and West. There will be familiar Hollywood spy thrillers such as the Michael Caine black-comic Funeral in Berlin (1966), as well as classic West German films such as Wim Wenders’ 1987 Wings of Desire and Jurgen Klauß’s 1981 The Border. But it is also be a rare chance to also see the Eastern perspective, whether in now-bizarre propaganda films such 1962’s as Look at this City, dramas which dealt with the daily realities of East Berliner (1957’s Berlin Schönhauser Corner), or painter and filmmaker Jürgen Böttcher’s stunning and complex The Wall 1990 – an East German’s very personal response to the end of the old order. Presented in association with the Embassy of the Federal Republic of Germany, and with support of the Goethe-Institut, Australia.

SUN ALLEY

(Sonnenallee) Dir: Leander Haussmann, Germany 2000, 90 mins, 35mm (unclassified 18+)

A 'mufta' is a multifunctional table, a 'Minetta' a radio, mopeds are 'Swallows' and asthma medication is the only recreational drug available. The Soviet Union is big brother and the Berlin Wall might be a bulwark against fascism. But Micha just won the heart of the prettiest girl at school. This is the DDR in the mid-1970, and Sun Alley is the street where Micha lives - mostly in the West, with just its tail in the East. Print courtesy of the Goethe-Institut, Australia.

BERLIN - SCHÖNHAUSER CORNER

(Berlin - Ecke Schönhauser) Dir. Gerhard Klein, 1957, 82 min. digital (unclassified 18+)

Hollywood’s 1950s youth rebellion – The Asphalt Jungle, Rebel Without a Cause – influenced director Gerhard Klein to use amateur teens to capture East Berlin youth culture of the late 1950s, and the allure of Rock 'n' Roll, consumer goods, and freedom from adult authority in those years prior to the Wall. Over 1.5 million viewers saw the film within three months after its premiere, but it was greeted with official suspicion and its filmmakers’ careers curtailed. Print courtesy of The Goethe Institut, Australia.

PROJECTING ON THE WALL

A special event held at NFSA marking the fall of the Berlin Wall and communism in Europe 20 years ago. The afternoon will focus on the events of 1989 and their historic importance. Equally, the afternoon will bring together peoples' experiences of the celebration of freedom, humanity and unity that rang around the world with the fall of the wall.
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GOODBYE LENIN

Dir: Wolfgang Becker, Germany 2003, 121 mins, 35mm (x)

When she comes out of a coma, one young East German man can't bring himself to tell his mother about the fall of communism. So within the boundaries of her room, he recreates a last surviving pocket of the old GDR. Ironically, in his attempts to control the information flow (down to fake GDR-style news reports) he begins to take on much the same Big Brother role as his vanished former nation. One of the hits that marked the newly revived and audience-aware German cinema of the 21st century.

LOOK AT THIS CITY

(Schaut auf diese Stadt) Dir.: Karl Gass, 1962, East Germany, 80 min, 16mm (unclassified 18+)

The most intriguing work of Wall-era propaganda, Look at this City compiled newsreels from both sides to make the case for the necessity of building the Wall to preserve the GDR. Its interpretation of post-war German politics seems now to come from a parallel universe: East Berlin is a city of peace; the West a frontline for Neo-fascism, Terrorism and Neo-colonialism; the Wall the way to secure peace in Europe. No other film so overtly helps us to understand the mindset of its builders and their times. From the NFSA Collection.

ONE-TWO-THREE

Dir: Billy Wilder, USA 1961, 115 mins, 35mm (G)

Coca-cola’s Berlin branch manager Jimmy Cagney has promotion to Coke’s European head office in the bag. But then his boss in Atlanta sends his rebellious daughter on a European vacation and quickly into the arms of a handsome East Berlin communist. With the Boss about to arrive, Cagney has to make the new husband over into an overnight capitalist. A great late-career role for Cagney, and a wicked adaption (by screenwriter IAL Diamond) of a Ferenc Molnár classic into era of Kennedy and Khrushchev.

THE LIVES OF OTHERS

Dir: Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck, Germany, 2006, 137 mins, 35mm (MA 15+)

East Germany, 1984: a rising Stasi investigator sets up a surveillance operation on one of the state’s favourite celebrity acting couples. As his bugs reveals their failing relationship and ideals, the watcher begins to rethink his attitude to the watched and to his job. Although still uncomfortable and controversial in modern Germany, the Best Foreign Film Oscar-winner has been one of the triumphs of its recent cinema, with an electrifying role for the late Ulrich Mühe (whose own East German theatre career is mirrored in the film).

FUNERAL IN BERLIN

Dir: Guy Hamilton, UK, 1966, 102 mins, 35mm (M)

The second of Len Deighton’s Harry Palmer novels to reach the screen again featured Michael Caine as a cockney anti-James Bond, forever cleaning up the mess made by the British spy game’s officers and gentleman. This time Harry goes to Berlin to bring in a Russian defector, but quickly begins to doubt who is actually defecting from what. The sense of the absurd and cynical moral comedy of the Cold War, embodied in divided Berlin’s geography, is probably never better captured in any of Hollywood or Pinewood’s spy thrillers. Imported print, courtesy of the Academy Film Archive.

DIVIDED HEAVEN

(Der geteilte Himmel) Dir.: Konrad Wolf, 1963, East Germany, 109 min (unclassified 18+)

Acclaimed as the East Berlin Hiroshima mon amour, and a key work of the brief period of cultural liberalisation, Konrad Wolf's film was the most overt of a cycle that explored the psychological and symbolic meaning of the Wall's construction for East Berliners. Banned in 1965, it’s rediscovery in the 1990s led to a re-evaluation of the New German Cinema as a whole, with one critic proclaiming it as proof that '…the New German Cinema began with DEFA'.

THE BORDER

(Die Grenze) Dir: Jürgen Klauß, 1981, 88 mins, 16mm (unclassified 18+)

Teams of surveyors from East and West Germany meet on the romantic border of old Bavarian and Saxony. At first, they cannot even agree upon what order to start work in. But after a few days they build friendships and respect for their cultural differences. Print courtesy of the Goethe Institut, Australia.

WINGS OF DESIRE

(Der Himmel über Berlin) Dir: Wim Wenders, Germany, 1987, 123 mins (PG)

In late 1980s Berlin Bruno Ganz is a literal ‘Angel of History’ – one of the thousands of who watch over the daily lives of the city. Bored with immortality, he ‘falls’ into real life and for a beautiful circus acrobat. But he also discovers other angels have taken this path and neither mortality nor immortality is perfect. Wim Wenders captures the milieu of West Berlin just before the Wall’s own fall (with cameos from residents such as Nick Cave). Imported print, courtesy of the Embassy of the Federal Republic of Germany.

THE BORDER

(Die Grenze) Dir: Jürgen Klauß, 1981, 88 mins, 16mm (unclassified 18+)

East and West Germany surveyors meet on the romantic border of old Bavarian and Saxony. At first, they cannot even agree upon what order to start work in. But after a few days they are pushing one another to work in wheelbarrows, and even playing football ("One to nil for Germany!" cries one). A time capsule of life in the two Germanys, it avoids ideology and acknowledges the genuine cultural differences of the two nations. Print courtesy of the Goethe Institut, Australia.

THE WALL

(Die Mauer) Dir: Jürgen Böttcher, 1990, 96 mins, 35mm, (unclassified 18+)

From November 1989 Japanese tourists took snapshots, entrepreneurs harvested its concrete and camera teams used it as a dramatic backdrop. East German filmmaker Böttcher’s ‘reverse-angle’ chronicle of the Wall’s remodelling – from Cold War-symbol into tourist trap – hints at the complex feelings some East Berliners felt about their new freedom. One of the last films made for the old state DEFA studio, its success at the 1991 Berlin Film Festival initiating a rediscovery of East German’s neglected film tradition.