September 2003 - Nr. 9
German film seeks top honor
in Venice
TWIG - After "Nowhere in Africa" took home the Oscar for best foreign film and "Goodbye Lenin" delighted audiences worldwide, another filmmaker is poised to put the international spotlight back on the German film industry. Margarethe von Trotta’s film "The Women from Rose Street" is among the competitors vying for the top prize at this year’s Biennale in Venice.
Von Trotta is no stranger to the Venice Film Festival, one of Europe’s most renowned. Having already won best in show - a Golden Lion - in 1981 for her film "Marianne & Juliane" ("Die bleierne Zeit"), she is now hoping that "The Women from Rose Street" ("Rosenstrasse") will again earn her top honors at Europe’s oldest film festival.
In her first cinematic release in ten years, von Trotta tells the true story of a group of German women living in central Berlin in 1943 who are faced with the deportation of their Jewish husbands and fiancés. Temporarily incarcerated in a Nazi facility on Rosenstrasse (Rose Street), the men are slated to be sent to Auschwitz, leading the women to stage a massive protest. Miraculously, the women force the authorities to relent, releasing the men to return to their homes and reunite with their loved ones.
Von Trotta became one of the New German Film’s most illustrious personalities through her roles in German director Reiner Werner Fassbinder’s films in the late 60’s and early 70’s. She has been directing her own films since 1975 and is one of the most important women directors in Germany today.
The last German to win a Golden Lion at the Biennale was Wim Wenders in 1982 for his film "The State of Affairs" ("Der Stand der Dinge "). Last year, Germany was represented in the competition by two films - Doris Doerrie’s "Naked" and Winfried Bonengel’s "Fuehrer Ex."
Between August 27th and September 6th, 20 films, most from Europe, will compete for the Golden Lion in Venice.
Links:
Venice Biennale
(http://www.labiennale.org)
German film
from the Goethe Institute
(http://www.goethe.de/kug/kue/flm/enindex.htm)
Margarethe von Trotta’s
"The Women from Rose
Street"
(http://www.rosenstrasse-derfilm.de/)
