Three days in April

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Movie
Original title Three days in April
Country of production Germany
original language German
Publishing year 1995
length 108 minutes
Age rating FSK 12
Rod
Director Oliver Storz
script Oliver Storz
production Dietger Bangsberg ,
Stefanie Gros
music Werner Fischoetter ,
Markus Schmitt
camera Hans Grimmelmann
cut Jürgen Lenz
occupation

Three Days in April is a German-French-Austrian film by director Oliver Storz from 1995 about the events in a German village at the end of the Second World War . The plot is based on a true story.

action

April 1945 in a Hohenlohe-Franconian village with the place name "Nesselbühl": Most of the residents are waiting for the American troops to march in and thus the end of the war. Gun thunder can be heard from a distance. In addition to retreating Wehrmacht troops, SS patrols are also present. They execute alleged deserters of the Wehrmacht who camped in the local inn without a marching order.

After a locomotive damage one night shortly before the end of the war, the Reichsbahn had to uncouple three freight cars and one passenger car from an SS special train and simply leave them standing in the station. The next morning the villagers find out what cargo the wagons contain: inmates of a concentration camp . Guarded by SS soldiers, the penned people starve and die of thirst. Their screams startle the villagers.

This reminds the local residents of the negative sides of the National Socialist regime. In the village, the management team is trying to make a decision: As they have learned, mayors, local farmers' leaders and station masters refer to the higher authorities. The pastor of the place was silenced years ago. Most of the residents of the village are preoccupied with their own problems. Only 20-year-old Anna, daughter of the farmer's leader Baisch, BDM leader of the village and ardent admirer of the leader, wants to help. She is secretly supported by the scattered singer of an entertainment troupe of the Wehrmacht. But when Anna is directly confronted with the misery of the prisoners, she vomits. Only one Polish forced laborer overcomes the apathetic rigidity of the villagers who are only watching and distributes food.

On the third day the SS soldiers suddenly disappeared after the singer secretly bribed them with wine. The film ends with some villagers pushing the wagons with the concentration camp prisoners into the neighboring community and thus into the unknown, shown dramatically through fog.

background

The author and director came across the subject in 1986 while researching his autobiographical novel “Nebelkinder” about his youth in Schwäbisch Hall : Storz, however, relocated the plot to the fictional location of Nesselbühl. This has nothing to do with the former Schmalegg town of Nesselbühl.

"Nesselbühl" stands exemplary for the events that took place to 6 April 1945 in the second Eckartshausen , turned my deterministic area of Ilshofen , in the district of Schwäbisch Hall in Baden-Württemberg have taken place: On April 2, 1945 remained after an air raid in the small town on the Heilbronn – Crailsheim line , halfway between Schwäbisch Hall and Crailsheim, an SS special train of the Reichsbahn for technical reasons. Four sealed, closed freight cars, known colloquially as cattle wagons, with 300 Jewish concentration camp prisoners are decoupled from the class 44 locomotive in the Eckartshausen station area and remain on the track under guard by Ukrainian SS soldiers. The people penned up to 75 people in the wagons of unknown origin are left to their fate, they starved and thirsted and their screaming was an horror for the inhabitants of Eckartshausen. The villagers tried in vain to get the responsible authorities to intervene, but were overwhelmed by the situation and "got rid of the problem" . On April 6, 1945, the local men probably pushed the wagons so that they could get onto the main line and let them roll along the gently sloping route towards Sulzdorf. The wagons rolled about nine kilometers in the direction of Schwäbisch Hall.

The characters and plot of the social drama are fictitious. Anna Baisch is a fictional character introduced dramaturgically by Storz. It is not known whether and how the villagers helped or wanted to help the prisoners.

As early as 1989, the Württemberg State Theater in Esslingen staged the dramatic play Die Barmherzigen Leut von Martinsried. A home piece by Oliver Storz. The presented topic was then further processed in the feature film in 1994. In the 2019/2020 season, the play will be performed again at the Württembergische Landesbühne in Esslingen.

The film was first broadcast on Arte on April 7, 1995 and was distributed in theaters in the summer of 1995.

Locations

The film was shot in Thuringia from October to December 1994 . Filming locations included: the city of Sömmerda , the municipality of Hardisleben , the train station outside the village of Griefstedt on KBS 335 on the Sangerhausen – Erfurt and Niederbösa railway line .

Reviews

“A carefully staged parable with partly excellent acting performances, but also structural weaknesses. She is always convincing and impressive when she carefully traces people's feelings. "

- Lexicon of international film :

"In this television film, director Oliver Storz creates the harrowing picture of a generation shaped by passivity, hasty obedience and delusion after twelve years of Nazi times."

- Cinema.de :

Awards

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Certificate of release for three days in April . Voluntary self-regulation of the film industry , December 2012 (PDF; test number: 136 260 V).
  2. ^ Hans Roth: Jump in time: Eckartshausen - Three days in April 1945 . Radio broadcast by Süddeutscher Rundfunk on April 5, 1995 in the main state archive in Stuttgart
  3. ↑ Three days in April. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed February 25, 2017 .Template: LdiF / Maintenance / Access used 
  4. ↑ tvspielfilm.de: Three days in April , requested on January 7, 2016