Rosa von Praunheim

Directing

Rosa von Praunheim

Born November 25, 1942 · Riga, Latvia

Died December 17, 2025 · aged 83

Rosa von Praunheim, born Holger Bernhard Bruno Waldemar Mischwitzky, was a German film director, author, painter and the most famous gay rights activist in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. A prolific director, he has made over seventy feature films. He began his career associated to the New German Cinema as a senior member of the Berlin school of underground filmmaking. He took the artistic femal…

Known For

Thirty Years with the WhipThirty Years with the Whip · 2024
Thirty Years with the Whip
★ 6.42024
MovieDocumentary
A portrait of Rosa von Praunheim's neighbor, who worked for decades as a professional dominatrix in Berlin's Wilmersdorf district. While the real Lady MacLaine reflects authentically and wittily on her life and work, her life is retold in dramatized scenes.
Can I Be Your Bratwurst, Please?Can I Be Your Bratwurst, Please? · 2008
Can I Be Your Bratwurst, Please?
★ 4.72008
MovieComedyHorror
A newly arrived guest of a Hollywood hotel charms and amazes the regulars, and they decide to invite him to their Christmas dinner.
Tally Brown, New YorkTally Brown, New York · 1979
Tally Brown, New York
★ 7.51979
MovieDocumentary
Tally Brown, New York is a 1979 documentary film directed, written and produced by Rosa von Praunheim. The film is about the singing and acting career of Tally Brown, a classically trained opera and blues singer who was a star of underground films in New York City and a denizen of its underworld in the late 1960s. In this documentary, Praunheim relies on extensive interviews with Brown, as she recounts her collaboration with Andy Warhol, Taylor Mead and others, as well as her friendships with Holly Woodlawn, and Divine. Brown opens the film with a cover of David Bowie’s “Heroes” and concludes with “Rock ’n’ Roll Suicide.” The film captures not only Tally Brown’s career but also a particular New York milieu in the 1970s.
Auf der Suche nach HeilernAuf der Suche nach Heilern · 2014
Auf der Suche nach Heilern
2014
MovieDocumentary
“I am a hypochondriac”, admits Rosa Von Praunheim, the icon of the gay movement, right at the beginning at the film. The director, who turned seventy in 2012, is afraid of cancer, and he actually suffers from glaucoma, with osteoarthritis in his big toe. Von Praunheim is interested in alternative medicine and goes on a foray into the scene.
The Einstein of Sex: Life and Work of Dr. M. HirschfeldThe Einstein of Sex: Life and Work of Dr. M. Hirschfeld · 2000
The Einstein of Sex: Life and Work of Dr. M. Hirschfeld
★ 5.52000
MovieDramaHistory
The life story of Dr. Magnus Hirschfeld, a German Jew, who as a physician established the field of sexology, and fought militantly against German anti-sodomy laws in the late 19th century. The script reveals main characters in Hirschfeld's life including impossible love interest Baron von Teschenberg, and Hirschfeld's aids- young Karl Giese and guardian angel, the transvestite Dorchen, as they establish the First Institute of Sexual Sciences in Berlin in 1920, and follows their struggles to keep it open, up to the rise of the Third Reich in the mid 1930s.
Rent BoysRent Boys · 2011
Rent Boys
★ 5.42011
MovieDocumentary
Documentary about the current hustler scene in Berlin. Based on interviews with former and active prostitutes, the realities of male prostitutes in Berlin are treated. The film is objective, and records the hustler scene as a social Submilieu, which is characterized by both tragic fates, as well as everyday things and routines. Not only the direct sale of sexual services is discussed, but also other aspects associated with male prostitution: poverty, drug addiction, AIDS, crime, migration, love and partnership.
I Feel Like DiscoI Feel Like Disco · 2013
I Feel Like Disco
★ 5.52013
MovieComedyDrama
A youth in middle of self-discovery, offending with his father, just discovering his sexuality and hiding it again. A boy who's often lonely loses a loved one and is in love with the wrong one.
PositivePositive · 1990
Positive
★ 4.21990
MovieDocumentary
This film powerfully documents New York City's gay community's response to the AIDS crisis as they are forced to organize themselves after the government's failure to stem the epidemic. Activists who are interviewed include playwrite Larry Kramer, People With AIDS Coalition co-founder Michael Callen (who died of AIDS in 1994), New York filmmaker and journalist Phil Zwickler, as well as representatives from ACT-UP, Queer Nation and the Gay Men's Health Crisis.

Filmography

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Tally Brown, New YorkTally Brown, New York · 1979
Tally Brown, New York
★ 7.51979
MovieDocumentary
Tally Brown, New York is a 1979 documentary film directed, written and produced by Rosa von Praunheim. The film is about the singing and acting career of Tally Brown, a classically trained opera and blues singer who was a star of underground films in New York City and a denizen of its underworld in the late 1960s. In this documentary, Praunheim relies on extensive interviews with Brown, as she recounts her collaboration with Andy Warhol, Taylor Mead and others, as well as her friendships with Holly Woodlawn, and Divine. Brown opens the film with a cover of David Bowie’s “Heroes” and concludes with “Rock ’n’ Roll Suicide.” The film captures not only Tally Brown’s career but also a particular New York milieu in the 1970s.

Producer