Between Pankow and Zehlendorf

Movie
Original title	Between Pankow and Zehlendorf
Country of production	Germany
original language	German
Publishing year	1991
length	94 minutes
Age rating	FSK 12
Rod
Director	Horst Seemann
script	Horst Seemann Rita Kuczynski (scenario) Angelika Mieth (dramaturgy)
production	DEFA , KAG “Johannisthal” Allianz Film Production
music	Horst Seemann
camera	Otto Hanisch
cut	Bärbel Bauersfeld
occupation
Corinna Harfouch : Isolde Wünsche André Hennicke : Emil wishes Kathrin Ackermann : Nora Permont Susanne Bormann : Child Susanne Ulrike Dräger : Child Gies Monika Lennartz : Director Peter Reusse : Hans Peter Prager : Willi Käthe Reichel : Old woman Calvin E. Burke : Mr. Whiteman Winfried Glatzeder : Music teacher Börne Horst Schönemann : Count Viola Schweizer : Karola K.-Dieter Klebsch : Director Sina Fiedler : Policewoman Roland Kuchenbuch : Policeman Marylu Poolman : Aunt Ellen Wilfried Loll : Landlord Carmen-Maja Antoni : Antiques seller Nicole Junck : Child Inge Whiteman Gertraud Kreißig : Sales point manager Klaus Hecke : Winkler Wolf-Jakob Seemann : child Jochen Erdmute Schmid-Christian : 1st saleswoman Theresia Wider : 2nd saleswoman Katharina Jacob : Mrs. Roth Susanne Czepl : Dorle Sandra Urlicki : Child Dagmar Renate Stephan : Mrs. Whiteman Shadia Hashim : Whiteman's maid Hannes Stelzer : Skinny man Gianina Gilge : waitress Eugen Albert : Soldier

Between Pankow and Zehlendorf is a German film adaptation by Horst Seemann from 1991 . It is based on the novel If I Were Not A Bird by Rita Kuczynski , who was also involved in the script.

action

Berlin in 1953: Mother Isolde has set up her life in Pankow with her daughters Gies and eleven-year-old Susanne . Father Emil is considered missing. The best friend of the music-loving Susanne is grandmother Nora Permont, a well-known singer who lived in America during the war and now lives in a spacious property in Zehlendorf . Nora is the greatest supporter of the gifted Susanne, who has been playing the piano for years and who has already won prizes as a great talent. Susanne regularly spends her time with Nora, where she can practice the piano in peace.

One day Emil returns home. He was a prisoner of war for the last few years and is also psychologically marked by the war. He believes that a new war is imminent and wants to prepare his family for this new time of struggle. Mother and children have to spend their free time with him through rough terrain, seek shelter on command or save themselves from imaginary low-flyers. Soon they start to rebel. Emil starts to drink and beats up his wife when she is late from work on the weekend. The children flee to their grandmother in horror. The next day, Nora confronts Emil, but he has already apologized to Isolde. When Nora offers him that he could go on a vacation trip to the south with Isolde at her own expense, he tells her out of the house. He doesn't want to be dependent on your money.

In the following years he continued to drill his children. Above all, the artistically gifted Susanne is effeminate in his eyes and is insulted by him for it. At school, a classmate from the parallel class asks her and her classmates to throw a frog against a wall, which would secure the window seats for the class on the next class trip. Nobody dares and the boy mocks the students. Susanne finally takes the frog and throws it against the wall. She is called to the headmistress and receives a reprimand. Emil is outraged about it, while Isolde looks for the fault in himself. As a woman actively involved in the reconstruction, she has too little time for her child and Emil, who makes money organizing fresh fish for Berlin, is hardly at home either. Susanne is therefore way too much with her grandmother. The headmistress notes that the western influence on the child is harmful and Isolde agrees.

A little later, Susanne was accepted as one of two children in the master class at the music school in Zehlendorf. Isolde appears at the party and announces that Susanne will no longer come to see her grandmother. If at all, she will attend a music school in the eastern sector. At home, Susanne is now forbidden to play the piano as soon as Emil is home. The sensitive girl despairs over the “ban on sounds” and imagines that she would have peace and quiet in prison to play. She steals toys and dolls at random in the hope of going to jail. Instead, she and her mother have to go to the youth welfare office. Susanne tells the supervisor that the ban on playing has robbed her of all meaning in life. For her, Nora was one of the pieces she played. Even when she plays the piano, the notes have stopped sounding since Emil was in the house. Isolde watched the conversation at the door and now allows Susanne to contact Nora again.

In his local pub, Emil discusses possible illegal ways to get hold of fish. There are rumors that loads of goods have disappeared. When he comes home, Isolde hands him a note. Two men went to see him. They wore leather coats. Emil packs his things and flees because he is involved in illegal business and fears his arrest. From time to time Emil writes letters to his wife from West Germany, but not to the children.

When Susanne comes to school a little later, there is great sadness there. Stalin is dead and Susanne is asked to play the piano at the funeral service. Flowers are organized for the celebration from the west. After the event, Susanne takes off her pioneer cloth. While other children are walking over a jumping field drawn with chalk, Susanne begins to jump off the fields according to the numbering.

production

The film was shot between Pankow and Zehlendorf from September to November 1990. The costumes come from Günter Heidemann , the film structures were created by Dieter Adam . The film premiered on December 4, 1991 in the Tivoli in Berlin and was panned by critics. It was Horst Seemann's last directorial work . In October 2007, Between Pankow and Zehlendorf appeared on DVD as part of the series Between the Times - Films from the Wende on Icestorm .

criticism

For film-dienst , Zwischen Pankow und Zehlendorf was a "pompous, clichéd and lengthy film that wants to give history lessons at the expense of its credibility, whereby the little everyday story gets under the wheels." The world stage criticized the "naive view of the East." and West, the cliché, woodcut-like figures, the phrase-like dialogues ”. “Staged too bombastic and lengthy,” said Cinema .

Other critics headlined "Defa '91 delivers clichés from the Cold War" and called the film "a story screwed up from back to front".

literature

• Between Pankow and Zehlendorf . In: F.-B. Habel: The great lexicon of DEFA feature films . Schwarzkopf & Schwarzkopf, Berlin 2000, ISBN 3-89602-349-7 , p. 720.

Web links

• Between Pankow and Zehlendorf in the Internet Movie Database (English)
• Between Pankow and Zehlendorf at filmportal.de
• Between Pankow and Zehlendorf at the DEFA Foundation

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Between Pankow and Zehlendorf. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed March 2, 2017 .  
2. ↑ Martin Mund: The very last . In: Weltbühne , No. 3, 1992.
3. ↑ See cinema.de
4. ↑ P. Claus: Defa '91 provides clichés from the Cold War . In: Spandauer Volksblatt , December 5, 1991.
5. ↑ D. Strunz: A story screwed up from back to front. In: Berliner Morgenpost , December 6, 1991.