We're sisters

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TV movie
Original title We're sisters
Country of production Germany
original language German
Publishing year 2018
length 90 minutes
Rod
Director Till Endemann
script Heide Schwochow
production Benjamin Benedict ,
Nico Hofmann
music Enis Rotthoff
camera Lars R. Liebold
cut Jens Müller
occupation

We Are Sisters is a German television film by director Till Endemann from 2018. The drama is a literary film adaptation of the book of the same name by the author Anne Gesthuysen , which was published in 2012 by Kiepenheuer & Witsch , and tells of three sisters, played by Jutta Speidel , Hildegard Schmahl and Gertrud Roll , who came together in 1994 after decades of estrangement on an estate on the Lower Rhine to celebrate the 100th birthday of the elders and in the process of talking to one another tore open old wounds.

action

Niederrhein, 1994. After 44 years of silence, the two sisters Betty and Hiltrud meet again for the first time on the occasion of Hiltrud's 100th birthday celebrations at Gutshof Verhoeven. Middle child Martha, who has maintained regular contact with both sisters over the years, is striving for reconciliation between her two siblings, who have fallen out for decades - also because Hiltrud, who came anything but voluntarily, depends on help after a fall and Martha hopes to be able to accommodate the jubilee with Betty, the owner of the spacious farm.

Although Martha fervently calls on her sisters for reconciliation, Hiltrud refuses to accept that she should speak to Betty, whose former lifestyle as a housekeeper and secret lover at the side of the late squire Heinrich Verhoeven she has always detested. Since her youth she has blamed Heinrich for the fact that her fiancé, Heinrich's younger brother Franz, died in the First World War and not only did not have a future together for the couple, but that Hiltrud was forced to live a lonely life in the civil service. Hiltrud, on the other hand, cannot forgive her sister that she was forced to give false testimony at the court trial in 1950 in order to cover up the secret liaison between Betty and Heinrich and, moreover, to protect the family's reputation.

Betty herself accompanied the consequences of the process throughout her life: after the death of his first wife, it was she who helped Heinrich to find a socially acceptable partner with her friend Anna Maria, because her own status was for the landowner despite his affection for the landowner had made her application impossible. The fact that Anna Maria found out about the extramarital affair, brought Heinrich to court for adultery and finally committed suicide after the complaint was dismissed , continues to burden her - although she and Heinrich continued to live happily under one roof after Anna Maria's suicide until his death .

Hiltrud's strictness also strains her relationship with Martha, who felt she was being patronized by her in important situations - especially when she caught her husband having sex with her cousin after his return from captivity after the end of World War II and Hiltrud forbade the mother of two children to take any consequences . When the two students Annekatrin and Ira, who are interviewing the sisters for a short film in front of the camera as part of the anniversary, are also caught having sex, old wounds break open on her too.

background

We Are Sisters is based on the novel of the same name by journalist and writer Anne Gesthuysen , which was published by Kiepenheuer & Witsch in 2012 . Gesthuysen was inspired to the plot of the book by three great-aunts, all of whom lived to old age and had an eventful life to look back on. Film producer Nico Hofmann , who described the book as “the most touching generation portrait in years”, immediately acquired the exploitation rights after reading it and commissioned screenwriter Heide Schwochow to write a script. She worked for three years "very freely based on the original" on the film adaptation, among other things changed the names of the protagonists and made the location details disappear. She described the collaboration with Gesthuysen as “love at first sight”. The journalist supported Schwochow with reports about her family significantly at work and visited various places on the Rhine with her , including the place Xanten in the Wesel district , where the storyline of the novel is set.

The main location for the film was Müddersheim Castle in Vettweiß .

The film adaptation of the book was produced by UFA Fiction in coproduction with ARD Degeto and Westdeutscher Rundfunk (WDR) on behalf of the first . Benjamin Benedict also appeared as a producer alongside Hofmann . The editing was done by Christine Strobl and Carolin Haasis from ARD Degeto and the WDR editors Barbara Buhl and Götz Bolten. The Film- und Medienstiftung NRW supported the project with a financial production grant of around 600,000 euros. The shooting took place from April 24 to May 31, 2017 mainly in the northeastern part of the municipality of Vettweiß in the district of Düren . Müddersheim Castle on the outskirts of the district of the same name served as the main backdrop and served as a representative for the fictional Verhoeven estate. The St. Amandus parish church , built between 1777 and 1778 with its rococo furnishings, was also used as a backdrop for one of the film's key scenes. Anne Gesthuysen took on an extra role in the film.

Nina Haun was responsible for the casting of the film. The roles of the three Janssen sisters were cast by a total of nine actresses, who show them in three periods of their lives together around 1915, 1950 and 1994. In addition to Jutta Speidel , Hildegard Schmahl and Gertrud Roll , all of whom were made up significantly older using make-up , the roles of the other two time levels for the characters Betty, Hiltrud and Martha Janssen were made by Christiane Bärwald (Betty, 1950), Claudia Geisler- Bading (Hiltrud, 1950), Caroline Ebner (Martha, 1950), Charlotte Banholzer (Betty, 1917), Caroline Hellwig (Hiltrud, 1917) and Nathalie Lucia Hahnen (Martha, 1917).

production

The feature film was made by UFA Fiction in coproduction with ARD Degeto and Westdeutscher Rundfunk (WDR). The shooting took place from April to May 2018 in the Müddersheim district of the municipality of Vettweiß in the Düren district and in other locations in the Ruhr area . Other leading roles included Benjamin Sadler , Anke Retzlaff , Victoria Schulz and Matthias Brenner in front of the camera of the ensemble film. It was first broadcast in December 2018 on the first .

Reviews

The main cast around Jutta Speidel received positive reviews for his game.

Rainer Tittelbach wrote in his review for Tittelbach.tv that Schwochow and Endemann had succeeded in creating a generational portrait with Wir sind noch Schwestern , "which is more and more under its spell from minute to minute". If "in the first shots, the elderly and shakily presented off-texts on display still need getting used to, then it is the faces furrowed by life that make you curious about the biographies of these three women". It is "a great pleasure, Jutta Speidel, Hildegard Schmahl and Gertrud Roll to watch these great actresses with their make-up on much older women". We are sisters “ hold back with outbursts of emotion. Then there is the structure of the narrative: the interactions between the heroines' experiences and the connections between the present and the past result in a mosaic that is clearly narrated from different perspectives and leaves kitsch no chance ”.

"The drama is a great role played by the title of actresses, but in walker told tempo like family history in the mirror of the 20th century," Tilmann P. Gangloff summed up in the Frankfurter Rundschau . The cinema format alone makes it clear that “this film wants to be great television”. But Endemann's direction weighs heavily, is characterized by a tendency to over-staging and is often based on "the classic keyword scheme of comparable works". Due to the short episodic flashbacks, "it is difficult for the actresses of the younger sisters to distinguish themselves, especially since these roles are not nearly as prominent". The fact that We Are Sisters is still worth seeing is thanks primarily to the three main actresses of the film; and the painful story that gradually unfolds ”.

Eric Leimann from the TV magazine Prisma wrote: “The multiple award-winning screenwriter Heide Schwochow tells the long life of the three sisters on three time levels: the sibling trio can also be seen as children and young women. The lion's share of the season, however, is done by the expressive older actresses: Hildegard Schmahl, Getrud Roll and Jutta Speidel ”. Till Endemann “this 'film of the century' turned out to be a little more difficult than it would have been good for the already aged material. In addition, a certain construction of the plot cannot be denied. Still, the sisters' game is impressive. Above all, the great theater actress Hildegard Schmahl is a stunner as a bitter centenarian who seeks redemption in the last few meters ”.

dpa criticized the fact that all the names and locations from the book were changed in the film, "partly also for legal reasons, some narrative threads from the book are neglected here, so two young filmmakers are unnecessarily introduced". On the other hand, We Sisters have succeeded in showing that "morality, reputation and class arrogance were at the top in post-war Germany and especially in the arch-Catholic Lower Rhine - including what was called decency and custom". The film “has a loving set-up, the music is used discreetly, the three main roles - depending on the generation - all have three casts. The three actresses Schmahl, Speidel and Roll seem a bit too young despite a good mask, but they all act great ”.

success

We're Sisters, premiered on December 22, 2018 on the first broadcast. With a market share of 8.9 percent at a total of 2.81 million, the feature film behind the ZDF television series Stubbe - Von Fall zu Fall and the RTL show Das Supertalent was the third most-watched production in prime time . In the advertising-relevant target group of 14 to 49 year olds, the market share was a below-average 3.6 percent.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Sabrina Heun: An accumulation of uncanny wealth . Retrieved December 24, 2018.
  2. ↑ a b c d Andreas Böhme: “We are sisters” - Guest of the women of the century . In: Berliner Morgenpost . Retrieved December 24, 2018.
  3. ↑ a b c d e f g Sabrina Heun: Visiting the filming of the novel "We Are Sisters" (AT) . Retrieved December 24, 2018.
  4. ↑ We're sisters after all . In: Crew United . Retrieved December 24, 2018.
  5. ↑ TV film "We Are Sisters" . Tittelbach.tv . Retrieved November 23, 2018.
  6. ↑ Tilmann P. Gangloff: Oho, there is something in the bush . Frankfurter Rundschau . December 22, 2018. Retrieved November 23, 2018.
  7. ↑ Reconciliation on the 100th birthday? . Prism . Retrieved November 23, 2018.
  8. ↑ Three ladies, one story . dpa . Retrieved November 23, 2018.
  9. ↑ Alexander Krei: Stubbe is back with top ratings on ZDF . DWDL.de . December 23, 2018. Accessed December 23, 2018.

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