The red Elvis

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Movie
German title The red Elvis
Original title The red Elvis
Country of production Germany , United States , Chile
original language German , English , Spanish
Publishing year 2007
length 89 minutes
Age rating FSK 6
Rod
Director Leopold Green
script Leopold Green
production Thomas Janze
music Mono mango
camera Thomas Janze
cut Dirk Uhlig
occupation

The Red Elvis is a German documentary from 2007 by Leopold Grün . It describes the rise and fall of the American singer and actor Dean Reed , who moved to the GDR and committed suicide there in 1986.

content

The documentary covers the time from Reed's arrival in the GDR to his fall and subsequent suicide. The film sheds light on his private life, his career as a film and music star, and his protests against the Vietnam War .
Many contemporary witnesses who accompanied Reed during the time have their say. These range from film colleagues such as Armin Mueller-Stahl , Celino Bleiweiß and Günter Reisch to his wife Wiebke Reed and politicians from Dean Reed's places of work.

Production background

The red Elvis had its world premiere on February 12, 2007 at the 57th Berlinale in the Panorama program.

The first work began in 2001. In a beer garden in the Berlin district of Prenzlauer Berg , Leopold Grün and Stefan Ernsting started talking about Dean Reed. Both decided to deal with the exceptional Dean Reed in their respective profession. Stefan Ernstings began his book The Red Elvis and Leopold Grün went in search of sponsors for the documentary of the same name. The fact that none other than Hollywood star Tom Hanks was also working on the project initially raised doubts, but then spurred the team on. In spring 2003, Leopold Grün and producer Thomas Janze sealed their collaboration with a handshake in a bar in Berlin.

When choosing the protagonists in question, the imprisoned Egon Krenz , a companion of the East German citizen Dean Reed, was at the top of the list. Krenz initially regretted not being available for an interview due to lack of time, but after his early release in 2003 he finally gave his consent for an interview. Another preferred candidate was the actor, musician and Dean Reed sympathizer Armin Mueller-Stahl. He, too, was of the opinion that the life story of the socialist rock 'n' roll idol is canvas-capable. Mueller-Stahl agreed to an interview about the man "who went into the cage from which everyone wanted to get out".

In conversations with insiders on the deanreed.de website , the name of Maren kept appearing . She allegedly owned special photos, hinted at details from his life that suggested that she knew a lot more than others. Leopold Grün got her phone number and after a few conversations they made an appointment in Berlin. She told of a long friendship and a relationship with Dean that they both referred to as a "project relationship".

Reed's Latin America tours and his commitment there against social injustice took him to Chile several times in the early 1960s. Isabel Allende Bussi , daughter of the former Socialist President Salvador Allende , already knew Dean Reed as a young girl and knows about the importance of the young, good-looking North American who sympathized with the Latin American liberation movement of the time. Despite the lack of time, she agreed to an interview in Valparaiso, Chile. A team of international employees carried out research abroad for two years. The telephone contacts on the trail of the well-traveled actor led to Russia , Italy , Latvia , USA , Chile , Nicaragua , Argentina and the Czech Republic , among others . Through the conversations and on the basis of the documents and secret service files requested from the countless archives around the world, the most significant stages in the life of the "red Elvis" gradually emerged.

The director Günter Reisch , whose last film project "Bloody Heart" with Dean Reed was never completed, turned out to be an ideal conversation partner. At several meetings in his house, he not only described the impressions from the last few years and days of Dean Reed, but also gave the film team a box with countless Super 8 roles. The footage shows Reed at private meetings on Lake Zeuthen, with children in a motorboat, on the shore of the lake or in the garden. There are also recordings of a work trip with Günter Reisch on the Baltic Sea island of Hiddensee , of filming location research in Central Asia and other parts of the former Soviet Union .

The collaboration with Will Roberts, a former documentary filmmaker and friend of Dean Reed, has proven to be very fruitful. He had met Reed in the 1980s and decided to make the film American Rebel: The Dean Reed Story about him. When the recordings were made in 1985, Dean Reed lived only half a year. From his film work, Will Roberts provided recordings from Palestine with Yasser Arafat , from Chile and from the GDR in his private living room with his last wife Renate Blume . She had given Will Roberts an interview at the time, which was a stroke of luck for the Red Elvis film team , as she had already signed an exclusive contract with Tom Hanks at the time of filming and was therefore not available for new interviews.

Reviews

The lexicon of international film judged: “Thanks to interesting interlocutors, cleverly selected, often metaphorically used film quotations and references to contemporary history, a portrait that is as serious as it is entertaining and follows in the footsteps of a political dreamer, but neither goes into the depths of speculation nor does it tends to uncritical enthusiasm. "

Renate Holland-Moritz , who had known Reed since 1978 and who reviewed some of his films, wrote in Eulenspiegel : “Leopold Grün's documentary Der Rote Elvis opens up the whole of Dean Reed in his turmoil . The director from Dresden paints an unadorned picture of the handsome American from Denver, Colorado. "

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ www.deanreed.de
  2. ↑ American Rebel: The Dean Reed Story. Internet Movie Database , accessed June 10, 2015 .
  3. ^ A b Renate Holland-Moritz: American file inspections . In: Eulenspiegel , 53./61. Vol., No. 10/07, ISSN  0423-5975 , p. 45.
  4. ^ Journal film-dienst and Catholic Film Commission for Germany (eds.), Horst Peter Koll and Hans Messias (ed.): Lexikon des Internationale Films - Filmjahr 2007 . Schüren Verlag, Marburg 2008, ISBN 978-3-89472-624-9 .