Closed Society (1978)

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Movie
Original title Closed society
Country of production GDR
original language German
Publishing year 1978
length Cinema: 121 minutes.
Television: 107 minutes
Rod
Director Frank Beyer
script Klaus Poche
Frank Beyer
production DEFA on behalf of
East German television
music Günther Fischer
camera Hartwig Strobel
cut Edith Kaluza
Cornelia Klein
occupation

Closed society is a contemporary film by Frank Beyer on television in the GDR from 1978 .

action

Ellen, an employee of the youth welfare service, and the engineer Robert from Berlin want to spend their vacation with their 5-year-old son and together with two befriended couples in a somewhat secluded holiday home. On the outward journey, they have to drive past an accident site where they recognize the car of one of the friends they are friends with. When Robert picks up the keys to the accommodation from Karl, who lives nearby, he receives a telegram in which the other couple also informs that it cannot come. To be on the safe side, Robert drives back into town and learns that the car belonged to his friends who were not responsible for the accident, and that both of them are seriously injured but not life-threatening. That means they have to spend their vacation alone.

The stay starts quite relaxing. The neighbor Karl, a former physicist, cares a lot about his son Nicky, who also likes it. He only recently learned from his parents that he had problems walking as a young child. Now he is trying to take advantage of this long-overcome illness in his parents' home.

Over time, the mood between Ellen and Robert becomes more and more aggressive. Even a TV set that has been brought in cannot help because there is no reception in the house. Ellen's desire for a vacation for three does not show the desired success, the opposite is the case. It turns out that the long-time troubled relationship between the two has been attacked more than they thought. The final row breaks out when Robert admits to having cheated. Ellen closes herself off completely and only treats her husband with cynicism. She even toyed with the idea of ​​paying it back in kind. For this she has her eye on the driver Bernd, whose brother she once looked after in her job as a youth worker a long time ago. After the younger boy was banned from Berlin, both lived in a small town near the vacation area. When she arrives there she is about to a fight between the two of them and Bernd; she just isn't sure who is Cain and who is Abel.

At the end of the film Robert asks whether they have become smarter and Ellen replies: "I don't know, maybe different."

production

Closed society was originally approved by all relevant authorities. Even the secretary of the SED Central Committee for Agitation and Propaganda, Werner Lamberz , had no objections. Only after his death did his successor Joachim Herrmann re- examine the film. There was no previous advertisement and the airtime was given for November 29, 1978 at 9:30 p.m. just under its title. Here, too, it was postponed several times without any notice, only to be broadcast late at night, without further announcement. After the broadcast, the film disappeared in the so-called poison cabinet and could not be shown again until December 3, 1989 in the first program of the GDR television.

The scenario came from Klaus Poche and the dramaturgy was in the hands of Eva and Heinz Nahke.

criticism

Just over a month after it was broadcast on December 25, 1978, Der Spiegel named the film

"... an explosive, brilliant piece about the crisis of a GDR couple who deal with private and social conflicts while on vacation."

The same article also puts the circumstances of its broadcast into the political context of its time. The film service writes:

“An excellently played, chamber-play description of the state of a private crisis that addresses forms of human stagnation and depression. The inextricably linked subtle criticism of society was considered sacrilege in the GDR ... "

literature

  • Closed society In: Ingrid Poss / Peter Warneke (eds.): Trace of films Christoph Links Verlag, 2006, ISBN 978-3-86153-401-3 , pp. 327 to 329.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Closed society in Potsdamer Latest News from April 19, 2016, p. 11
  2. ↑ DDR / TELEVISION: managed by the throat . In: Spiegel Online . tape 52 , December 25, 1978 ( spiegel.de [accessed July 16, 2019]).
  3. ↑ Closed Society (1978). Retrieved July 16, 2019 .