Films with: Zirner, August

Gëburtig

The past catches up on two men, a Jewish emigrant composer Hermann Gëburtig and the German journalist Konrad Sachs. Gëburtig testifies against a former concentration camp supervisor, and Sachs faces the reality that his father was an SS-Doctor.

DVD 3190

Taking sides

After Hitler took over power in 1933, many Jewish artists were forced to leave Germany. Wilhelm Furtwängler choose to stay. Though never a member of the party, he was a receipient of honors associated with party membership. However, the conductor often used his position and contacts to save hundreds of Jewish musicians from concentration camps. When U.S. Major Steve Arnold is tasked with the pre-trial investigations, his aim is to prove that the conductor's genius contributed to the Nazi propaganda, while Furtwängler insisted he stayed to bring comfort to the German people with his music.

DVD 3036

Versprechen The promise /

East-Berlin, 1961, shortly after the erection of the Wall. Konrad, Sophie and three of their friends plan a daring escape to Western Germany. The attempt is successful, except for Konrad, who remains behind. From then on, and for the next 28 years, Konrad and Sophie will attempt to meet again, in spite of the Iron Curtain. Konrad, who has become a reputed Astrophysicist, tries to take advantage of scientific congresses outside Eastern Germany to arrange encounters with Sophie. But in a country where the political police, the Stasi, monitors the moves of all suspicious people (such as Konrad's sister Barbara and her husband Harald), preserving one's privacy, ideals and self-respect becomes an exhausting fight, even as the Eastern block begins its long process of disintegration.

DVD 12351