Mobile Navigation
News from a Walled City
Redupers—The All-Around Reduced Personality (Germany, 1977)
Redupers—Die allseitig reduzierte Persönlichkeit
Edda, a freelance press photographer, lives in West Berlin as a single mother struggling to get by. She joins a group of women working on an art project to convey life in a walled city: The wall will be depicted in giant photos on billboards throughout the city, while the view into East Berlin from the tourist lookouts at various spots in West Berlin will be covered with curtains, transforming the city’s division into a Brechtian theatrical spectacle. Helke Sander’s film is an essay about the estrangement that West Berliners felt being surrounded by the Berlin Wall, living in the “forbidden” part of the capital of East Germany.
35mm, b/w, 98 min. Director: Helke Sander. Producer: Maya Faber-Jansen. Screenwriter: Helke Sander. Cinematographer: Katia Forbert. Editor: Esther Dayan, Ursula Höf. Cast: Helke Sander, Ronny Tanner, Gesine Strempel.
Location Berlin (Germany, 1986/7)
Drehort Berlin
This poetic documentary shows people and situations from both East and West Berlin. As if invisible, the camera crosses over the wall several times, fusing the experiences into something that didn’t exist in the mid-eighties—outside of the cinema. 25 years after the Berlin Wall was built, perhaps the most horrifying aspect was that the Berliners took it for granted and had learned to ignore it. The wall was mirrored in everyone’s head. This film questions that ingrown attitude.
35mm, color, 113 min. Director: Helga Reidemeister. Screenwriter: Helga Reidemeister.
