Helke Misselwitz

In the little town of Herzsprung - whose name harks back to an ancient legend of broken hearts - almost nothing has changed since German unification, except a rise in unemployment. Johanna, a young mother and widow, becomes one of the unemployed and lives on welfare. To make matters worse, she falls in love with a dark-skinned, roving adventurer and the whole village starts talking about it.

Eve and Adam meet in Eden. It soon becomes apparent that they don’t find each other particularly attractive. But do they have a choice? Writing helps. They each start keeping a diary about this first encounter between two human beings — from very different perspectives, as one might imagine. And as they get on each other’s nerves and recount terrible things about each other, they discover an unexpected new emotion: love.

Portrait of a private coal company in East Berlin's Prenzlauer Berg district in 1988/89. The feisty woman boss runs the business with humour and understanding. Her seven male employees respect her. To the outside world, they are all tough guys, but as they describe their jobs and personal situations, above and beyond the hard manual labour, their vulnerability starts to come to light.

Paul Celan’s poem echoes. A drive reveals a long-abandoned Gründerzeit villa in ruin. Inside, a woman in elegant WWI attire dances, then slumps in mourning. After the war she cleans, reappears in 1930s riding clothes amid radio discontent as a maid and housekeeper move through the halls. Mourning returns with WWII’s end. Post-war, she dances to American rhythms, breastfeeds under Soviet-occupation broadcasts. Beatles and Pink Floyd play as a woman in overalls emerges, memories of the century flooding her mind. She climbs into a Trabant Kübel, helmet beside her, determined to give the villa a new life.

A small town shortly before the end of the GDR: 15-year-old Ulla lives with her mother in a dilapidated old building where not even the electricity works properly. Economy of scarcity and national bankruptcy are visible everywhere. Only higher party comrades live in the lap of luxury. When Ulla meets Winfried after a summer bathing trip, the two fall in love. Winfried is the son of an influential general director and owns things from West Germany that others only dream of: a computer, a games console, a walkman. On an excursion with her biology class, the high school student discovers that a dacha is being built in the middle of the nature reserve and the creek has been dammed. Winfried's father turns out to be the culprit, but the mayor is on his side. Ulla rebels against this environmental destruction connected to political corruption and organizes a protest. Her activism not only endangers her own future, but also her first great love.

Ramona lives her lonely life in Berlin working in a lipstick factory. One day she accidentally runs into Andrzei, a Polish mechanic illegally selling cigarettes in Germany during the weekend. One thing leads to another, and soon she finds herself pregnant. Then her life starts falling apart, when Andrzei tells her he already has a wife back in Poland and her baby dies shortly after its premature birth.

A locomotive journey traversing the North to the South of the German Democratic Republic on the eve of its dissolution. Labourers, punks, mothers, intellectuals, young and old are implored to reflect on their life choices, the sacrifices they've made, and their place in the world. Despite everything, hope persists.

In early summer 1989, Helke Misselwitz portrays young musicians in a band who produce their music on other people’s waste items. The four boys call themselves "Bulk Rubbish" and they drum out their resentment, having grown up on the new housing estates of East Berlin. A straight-up picture of the GDR youth is presented here, which in no way conforms to the official image. The film crew concentrates on the observation of the boy Enrico and his mother Erika: when the mother marries in the West, her son decides to stay in East Berlin, bidding her farewell at the border-crossing. Only shortly after, the tables are turned again: as the events in Berlin leading up to the fall of the Wall are practically captured live from the film crew, Enrico insists on maintaining his cultural identity, even after the fall of the Wall. The "Bulk Rubbish" musicians want to remain citizens of their own state and perceive the looming reunification with scepticism.