Willi Schrade

The philosopher Democritus has a toothache, so a dentist from ancient Abdera sets off for his house. En route, he gets into a fight with a donkey driver. This conflict eventually causes all of Abdera to go crazy. Just when the city is seconds away from having a civil war, Democritus' apprentice shows up to ease the city's tensions with a gift.

In a German village in 1942, farmer Heinrich Marten is conscripted, leaving behind his wife Kathrin and sister Frieda. As the two young women cannot manage the farm alone, they are given help by the state: a prisoner of war. The Russian Alexei is emaciated and has to be nursed back to health by the women. Working together in the fields and on the farm, Kathrin and Frieda inevitably get closer to the Russian. The resolute Frieda is courted by the local farmer Otto Lange and is at the same time dependent on him. A love affair develops between Kathrin and Alexei. They make love in a shed. But the couple is discovered by a soldier and Alexej flees. He is caught by young Nazis and taken away.

Philipp, a closeted teacher, is dating a female colleague to keep up appearances. One night he stumbles into a gay bar and falls for a man. Transformed by this love, he is no longer afraid to face up to who he is.

Four years have passed since Alma and Dr. Kröpelin got married. The home zoo in Groß-Klückow is thriving and Alma is completely absorbed in her new role. But she still finds time to take care of things that, strictly speaking, are none of her business.

This quirky episodic comedy weaves together three plotlines centered around the employees of a car garage, with some unexpected fairytale elements to get things moving. A woodland fairy convinces shy bookkeeper Piel to suddenly start driving his Trabi far above the speed limit. Manager Neumann sells his soul to a black cat in order to purchase a more respectable vehicle. And a spirit named "Car Accident" offers to warn owner Sengebusch about upcoming traffic accidents so he can make money by always being the first on the scene.

This elaborate two-part television film features a section from the life of communist worker leader Ernst Thälmann. It begins with the bloody riots on May 1, 1929 in Berlin, in which police officers shot at demonstrating workers, and ends with February 7, 1933, when Thälmann appeared as a speaker at the illegal meeting of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Germany in goat neck. This period was marked by the struggle of the Communists against the ever stronger National Socialists and the rise of Adolf Hitler.

The film tells the tragic fate of railroad guard Thiel at the end of the 19th century. Thiel, who spends his days in the dull, monotonous fulfillment of his duties, has lost his gentle, quiet wife Minna. He remarries out of concern for his young son Tobias. His second wife Lene, with whom he also has a child, is superior to him in vitality and has a rough passion. He discovers that his child from his first marriage is being discriminated against and tormented by her - Thiel withdraws more and more into himself and becomes lonely. When Tobias is killed in an accident, he blames Lene, and disaster is inevitable...

Major Leska, who has proven himself as a troop officer in a tank battalion in complicated maneuvers, is to become an instructor. He sees this as a challenge and is looking forward to the new task. But then the decision is made in favor of his friend Hans Helbig, who has just graduated from the military academy with distinction and was once Leska's subordinate. The conflict that erupts between Leska and Hans puts a strain on their working relationship and puts their friendship to the test. They have to prove themselves during an important maneuver.

The main character Otto, the "best man", is a copy of the illustrious Mister Bean. He takes on an apprenticeship as a building-worker, which makes him a member of a building brigade. At the same time Otto tries to start a love affair, which he handles even clumsier. Never the less Otto makes progress with the lady in question, a single mother, who apparently doesn't mind. Actually he wanted her sister, but a retired Leninist party member changes his mind. This gives him the courage to persevere in his work, albeit with the helping hand of the obligatory retired party member. And behold, in the end Otto invents a new method of building, which saves the brigade many hours of work.

1934, Germany. The ten-year-old Peter lives in a small town with his parents. His father, an underground Communist, is arrested. In the summer vacation the kids from the neighbourhood fight in two teams, which prevail in turns. One team, led by Ewald, imitates the Nazis, while the other, headed by Fritz, follows his Communist father's example.

One day, the happily married Karl Lehmann is asked by his single colleague, Mrs. Schmidt, for an unusual service: She wants a child. Lehmann is willing to help. His wife Inge and Mrs. Schmidt have a child at the same time, and since the women like each other, they make an agreement. They share Karl Lehmann. One week Inge gets him, one week Mrs. Schmidt - always alternating. It could be nice if it weren't for the prudish, shocked or even envious people around them. However, some see it in a positive light. A Mr. Schmidt is interested in Inge's week off and a colleague Lehmann is interested in Mrs. Schmidt's week off. And it's not long before Mr. Karl Lehmann is booted out and seeks refuge with a waitress.

After a long period as a prisoner of war, Joachim Ott returns home to find that his wife is now living with another man.

Kai, a young boy, living in 1923 Berlin tries to convince an American businessman that he can market his chewing gum better than anyone else in town.

The school authorities want to read success stories in director Joachim Faber's reports. But they cannot simply be produced on an assembly line. Pupils, for example, use the wrong tone. The matter draws circles until the superiors finally talk about refusal to work. Director Faber is caught between the efforts to resolve the conflict with pedagogical means and the pressure from above.

The plot revolves around three men waiting to be deported in a prison. To escape the monotony, they form chess pieces from their bread rations, with which they then play against each other. Grünstein, a Polish Jew, proves to be a real talent, because although he is a beginner, he manages to defeat even the experienced player Lodeck, a German sailor, with his "Grünstein Variant".

Willi Zubrodt is delegated by his department to a parachuting course at the GST. As he is not very disciplined, has no respect for the instructors and does not fit into the collective, the instructors try to show him up and force his expulsion from the course. However, the attempts to prove that he had gaps in his theory and physical condition were a complete failure. Zubrodt manages to turn the tables each time.

In 1903, Jan Anskath and his half-brother Martin are living in Rajgorod at the border between Russia and Prussia – Jan on the Russian, Martin on the Prussian side. Both are occasionally smuggling stuff over the border. But while Jan acts from political conviction and is smuggling illegal writings over the border, Martin is only interested in the money. That is why he does not question his shadowy client when he sneaks out refugees into Russia. But then it becomes evident that the distinguished gentleman has robbed the refugees from all of their belongings, only to turn them over to the authorities of the Czar.

A life-threatening heart attack confines Richard Roth to the hospital bed. There, Richard, who is in his late fifties, asks himself what will remain of him and his life. What happened to his four daughters? Do they take after him? How have they developed? His youngest daughter Nanny, who is still living with her father, gets her three other siblings to Weimar to visit their father.

Vera Urban is on a ski holiday with her children. Her two admirers - the sailor Winter and Savings Bank leader Martin - travel enthusiastically in the snow to finally conquer the heart of their worshiped in a relaxed holiday atmosphere. There are also times to use unfair means to cut out the side buhler. But the two competitions get unimagined: Vera's ex-husband Georg also spends holidays in the same hotel. Does old love flare up again?

At the freight yard of a small town in East Germany, a railcar loaded with Russian sparkling wine is causing a stir. Looters appear to have broken open the car’s doors, yet not a single bottle is missing. Major Bauer of the State Security Service and his team of investigators take on the case and quickly discover that something is amiss with the cargo’s accompanying documents.

The early 1930s in Berlin. Cabaret artist Emil Damaschke wants to entertain people with his program - together with Ida, the attraction from Hungary. But because he risks a lip that is too big, he is thrown out of the "Rosenthaler" cabaret, ends up on the criminal circuit and briefly in prison. Back out again, he and his colleagues leased the "Rosenthaler", whose Jewish owners had fled abroad to escape the Nazis. They set up a cooperative. However, a gang of criminals who professed allegiance to the Nazis wanted a share of the profits and believed they had a free ride. Emil rejects Ida's intention to win over the workers as a new audience, he makes money with advertising and refuses to join the criminals. They kidnap Ida, murder her in the forest and make sure that Emil is framed for the murder. Emil ends up in prison and the criminals take over the cabaret - in Nazi uniform.

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The action takes place in Moscow, Berlin and Vienna in years 1932 and 1933, a time when the great Bulgarian revolutionary and internationalist Georgi Dimitrov was actively involved in establishing a broad alliance of democratic forces against the emerging threat of war and fascism.

Paul and Paula have had bad experiences with love: Paul is financially well off but has lost all affection for his wife, and Paula leads a troublesome life raising two children on her own. They meet and discover a strong passion for each other. Life seems like a dream when they're together - but their short flights from the burdens of reality are once and again interrupted by Paul's ties to family and career.

The story of Ulzana, an Apache chief who has reached a rapprochement with the local Mexican population and generously extends it to whites who travel through the territory. His people have become inured to the treacherous ways of the white man, however, and are now reliant on them for booze, 'relief flour' and beef steak.

The story of a philanderer behind the wheel of a cab, who gets into a series of hilarious but also adventurous situations, was based on the actual experiences of Berlin cab drivers. It is an entertaining portrayal of how the main protagonist, Eddy, is to be cleverly dissuaded from his dashing bachelor life. Gaby and her grandpa come up with a few ideas. This is necessary, because Eddy may be a proper cab driver, but in his private life he knows no rules when it comes to winning over pretty girls.

This five part epic war drama gives a dramatized detailed account of Soviet Union's war against Nazi Germany during world war two. Each of the five parts represents a separate major eastern front campaign.

After a ten-year absence, Severino returns to his tribe, the Manzeneros, who live on the edge of the Argentinian Andes. The reason for his visit is to take his younger brother back with him up north. However, in his home village, Severino finds a tense and troubled situation. His father Raymundo has recently been found dead. He was on the tracks of a gang of white bandits who had stolen cattle from both Indians and settlers. A sheep breeding company is behind these criminal machinations. This company seeks to drive the Indians and settlers off the fertile land so that they can purchase it cheaply.

A young blacksmith, searching for happiness in a series of dreams, realizes that he must find a rejected princess and hold her hand. A fairytale after the Brothers Grimm.

The film describes the activity of an ABV of the People's Police in its section in East Berlin. A mixture of “positive” characters from the beginning, the extensively staged “owl”, who is introduced as a criminal and over the course of time, especially due to the influence of the ABV, develops into a good citizen, and incorrigible characters, with whom the ABV fails with its extensive attempts at rehabilitation and who are arrested after having committed again offenses.

Boatman Ahrens from Hamburg has a sense of justice when it comes to finding a missing girl. He goes down illegal paths when he breaks into someone else's villa. He is caught by the millionaire entrepreneur Ofterdinger and his employee. It turns out that everything is connected to the death of a Turkish citizen who came to Hamburg penniless and worked in the port without papers. Ahrens suspects that it must be a crime...

A socialist story of "atoms for peace" and compulsory labor in an East German uranium mine under Soviet control.

Mechanic Hannes Blaschke and his wife Maxi, who works as a bus driver, have just become happy parents of twins. Now they have a serious transportation problem: Their Trabant is far too small for the grown family that furthermore includes two sons and a dog. Thanks to the support of a state secretary and of his brigade, Hannes acquires a Tschaika – a limousine that is normally restricted to representational purposes – for a small price. Whereas Maxi views the state carriage only as a useful means of transportation, Hannes enjoys the unusual pre-emption he is receiving for the spectacular car. Hannes, who normally is just a humble guy, starts to grate his colleagues with his new affectations. Thus, they teach him an effective lesson: They decorate the state carriage with flowers and thus bring Hannes back down to earth in a humorous way.

A story about funny adventures young boy Mirco and a drillers blue helmet.

One year has passed since Max and Wanda got their divorce. Max has come to the realization that he wants his ex-wife back - no matter what the cost! So he concocts a sneaky plan: he asks Wanda to hide him from the police, who are apparently looking for him. At first, Wanda rejects all his attempts to restart their relationship. But she is soon unable to resist Max's convincing promises and even throws her lover out of the house. But then she discovers Max's lie.

Friedrich Wilhelm Georg Platow worked for the railways his entire working life. He took up service at the small station of Luege 34 years ago. Now, the line is to be electrified and Platow, who cannot cope with the new technology, has to work on a secondary local line. Georg, his son, a railway worker as well, is to attend a training course, but Georg refuses to go. Then his father comes to a surprising and highly unusual decision. He pretends to be Georg Platow, making himself twenty years younger than he really is and registers for the course.

Eight-year-old Matthias dreams that he will someday become a pilot and his divorced parents will get back together. He waits yearningly for his ninth birthday because his father has told him the story of Icarus, and promised to take him on a sightseeing flight. When Matthias' father doesn't come home, he is devastated. He runs throughout the city, talks to his friend about the relationships of adults, looks for his father at his desk, and gets himself into conflict with the police. As he sits alone on the roof of a house, he comes to the conclusion that Icarus didn't plummet to the earth because he didn't listen to his father, but rather because his father had forgotten him.

Slovakian villagers towards the end of WW II are despairing as German troops fall back to their village.

In 1960, farmer Walter Wagemühl learns from the West that his life is coming to an end. In order to pass the farm into loyal hands, he sends his adopted daughter Catharina to the East to marry his prudent nephew Ewald. The surprising request puts him in a huge quandary. He is about to take his final exams and the university officials have earmarked an academic career for him. But Ewald wants nothing more than to become chairman of the socialist cooperative in Hullerbusch. And now this too...

Ernst is a student in Hamburg around 1900 and leads a life like many other young people. In his free time, he roams the colorful metropolis with his buddy Karl. After school, he helps his father, whose business he is to inherit one day. Ernst has many questions about the world and life, but it is difficult to find satisfactory answers... At this time, nobody suspects that he will go down in the history books as the workers' leader Ernst Thälmann.

Suse works as a truck driver on a major construction site. The young woman has a hard life behind her. She was foundling, was raised by farmers. Manne, the father of her child, wanted to escape from the GDR and is in prison. After he is released, Manne wants to live again with Suse and their child together. But she rejects him as well as another worshiper. Suse is more interested in the Soviet engineer Boris, but apparently not for her, since he can never remember her at their chance encounters. But a much bigger problem - and a difficult one - is Suse, when she is offered to go to the Soviet Union for six months.

Helmut Kamp, the construction brigade leader, a man no longer young, life immediately confronted several difficult and woeful problems. The birth of a son, the tragic death of his wife, the relationship of his daughter Ingrid with Dr. Beißert coincided with the need to move to an uninhabited area where a nuclear power plant will be built. Kamp, Ingrid and the members of the friendly brigade decide to act as the duty and the feeling of partnership prompts them, and gradually they all become participants in the new construction...

A story of Victor Jara - one of the most popular singers in Chile.

In this East German film, the third one in The Third is Margit's third lover. After her mother's death, Margit has two affairs which don't work out, and one lesbian friendship which she retains. She is looking for a husband, though, and thinks she has spotted a candidate in her fellow factory worker. As she contemplates marrying him, her story is told in a series of flashbacks.

As American settlers encroach on the lands of the Lakota people, Tokei-ihto witnesses the murder of his father at the hands of Red Fox, who wanted information on where the tribe finds its gold. Two years later, at the height of the Great Sioux War, Tokei-ihto and Red Fox meet again.

Maria, a young student sees her brother Dieter going to prison for sedition against the state. She starts an affair with Paul, a judge who turns out to be the one who sentenced her brother, which eventually leads to a confrontation.

This comedic musical tells the story of Gabi, a young hairdresser from the Baltic coast who desperately wants to be a jockey. One day, she packs her bags, drives to Hoppegarten, and is soundly rejected by the head coach. Gabi doesn't want to give up, and in order to at least have a roof over her head, she rushes into a marriage with the seemingly nice Freddie. However, this marriage soon proves to be her second rejection, as Freddie openly dislikes the fact that she wants to be a jockey.

Rome at the time of the persecution of Christians: Androclus, a poor tailor, frees a lion in the forest from terrible pain caused by a thorn in his paw. The two meet again by chance when the devout Christian is about to be thrown to wild animals in the arena. The lion spares him with gratitude, but the real danger for Androklus comes from another direction.

In San Marengo, master thief Cesare Giovanini’s heists leave local merchants profiting from hefty insurance claims. When captured, he’s granted luxury prison comforts, and even nightly “private visits”, in exchange for continuing his work under police supervision. Bored, Cesare escapes, only to be recaptured with an unexpected offer: a lucrative board position instead of bars.

Günter has completed his electrical engineering degree and returns to Berlin. His old foreman and his wife welcome him and want to take a Sunday trip to Grünau, but he wants to visit a mechanical engineering exhibition that is only open that day. The old gentlemen accompany him to Stalinallee, and here something fateful happens: Günter meets the girl he has always fancied again ...

During a weekend spent on the island Hiddensee, the snobbish high school student Jan, who has just been expelled from school, meets Christine. Christine is impressed with his bragging attitude although he just uses it to hide his insecurity and his remorse about the fact that he was sacked. Naturally, he keeps quiet about his current situation. Christine’s companion Hannes is less thrilled about Jan. Later on, the three of them meet again at a dockyard in Stralsund. After the disreputable end of his school career, Jan is assigned to the very brigade in which Christine and Hannes work as a crane operator and a brigadier respectively.

A dead body is found in a burning car on the Berlin-Leipzig highway. The police investigate: Murder. Objects found in the car point to gold smuggling. At the funeral of the murdered man, his circle of acquaintances is scrutinized. They are all suspects. The trail leads detective Lindner to a bar.

A fantasy story about the young boy Lutz who is looking, with two friends, for a missing magical bird.

Kasper Mai, an export merchant and comrade with a “clean” record, discovers he is the prince of Hohenlohe-Liebenstein. His royal grandmother designates him as the heir to her estate. A private trip to her reveals that she does not want a NATO airbase built on her land. The GDR and his grandmother thus find a common interest, and a clever lawyer from the East works against other family members looking to settle their debts with the estate money.

At the VII Party Congress of the SED, a delegate tells a reporter his life story: 18-year-old returning soldier Georg Lendau ends up in a small village in 1945. He is starving and sick. Mayor Kallam helps. Later, they meet again; Kallam is now the director of a heavy engineering company. He gives Georg, who is a lathe operator, work. But Kallam has more plans for him and wants to send him to university. Georg refuses. An extra shift, which he only did so that he could buy his future wife wedding shoes, brings him into conflict with backward colleagues - and the realization that you first have to work better if you want to live better. He followed this insight with action, becoming a master craftsman, comrade and student.

This East German movie was co-produced with studios in Hungary and Yugoslavia, with many interesting location shots (border checkpoint to West Berlin, the Gellert bath in Budapest, and more). The plot is about French drug dealers, who obtain heroin somewhere in the Middle East, and smuggle it in several steps to East Berlin, and from there to France (or so it appears), killing when necessary. The hero is an officer of East German customs, who with detective work, some masquerade, and occasional violent action ultimately unravels the whole network, of course with the support of the local customs departments.

Four directors - four styles - four episodes, all relating the events of a single night which has entered the history books: August 12-13, 1961. There are thousands of complex narratives connected with the frontier drawn through the middle of Berlin, and each episode relates the story of a difficult decision made on that night...

Film by Frank Vogel.

Reporters tell lies about East Germany.

The film tells the love story of two young couples. According to their social ranks, construction worker Edy is dating employee Siegi, while medical student Dieter is dating art school student Sonja. Rather unintentionally, they exchange partners. During a carnival ball, Dieter makes out with Siegi because he falls for her her fresh and happy girlish manner. Sonja coolly observes this game and sees this intermezzo as a test for their relationship. While Siegi and Dieter vacation at the sea, Sonja falls in love with Edy. Now the die seems to be cast for new constellations. But when both couples stand in front of the registrar’s office, they finally come to their senses.