Last night I watched GOODBYE LENIN, in the original German and no subtitles. I'm clever like that*. Great film. It tells the story of an East Berlin family in 1989 before the wall came down. The mother of the family has a heart attack and lies in a coma for 8 months. When she comes round, her family is warned that any excitement could kill her. So they have to pretend everything is as it was and that they are still living in the socialist paradise that was the DDR. It has many comical as well as moving moments. It's three hours long but well worth it. Buy it (with subtitles!) HERE.* Actually, it was a challenge I set myself. I lived in Germany for two years and studied German at university. At one stage I was completely fluent. I wanted to watch the film partly to check whether I could understand everything still. Mission accomplished!
43 comments:
what do you want a pat on the back? or are you just showing off...
Iain, it is indeed an enjoyable film, which I believe has produced a huge amount of nostalgia in the former East Germany. Such a reaction is I suspect symptomatic of a desire to hark back to times of perceived stability, even if under a harsh totalitarian regime, when facing present financial and political uncertainty.
I wonder whether you were prompted to watch the film on account of the recent reports of the real life incident mirroring the film: the man who has just woken up in Poland after a 19 year coma. The last thing he remembered was General Jaruselski and communism! Quite remarkable.
I loved it and felt the alternate history that the lead character worked out to explain reunification was, frankly, infinitely better than the rather shabby reality. But I was a Radio Moscow listener back in the Brezhnev days, a former Soviet Weekly reader, and someone who isn't totally convinced the right side won the Cold War...so I would say that, wouldn't I?
And in a case of life imitating art, a Pole wakes up from a nineteen year coma to find the Soviet Union replaced by the European Union.
great film. One of my favourites. Also like how in his attempts to recreate the communist state. He actually started to create it in his own vision. Where it actually was a nice place to live.
I loved the film but I am a bit dubious about its politics. Yes, it did expose the ludicrous nature of East German propaganda, but at its heart it was a celebration of one of the nastiest police states on the planet - yet the Stasi don't even get mentioned.
Do you have a special slow DVD player? The running time is listed as two hours, not three.
Iain
Have you seen "The Lives of Others" (Das Leben der Anderen)? A brilliant film that captures the oppressive atmosphere of the former DDR. I think that is a healthier film to see than the Ostnostalgie of Goodbye Lenin. And yes, I could understand the film without subtitles - fortunately it was more or less all in Hochdeutsch unlike some German films.
Martin
The Porcupine is very good a Julian Barnes book that examines the contradictions of Liberalism confronted with an old Eastern dictator coming out of the end of the cold war.
I would recommend "Notes on Scandal which I saw last night. Think " The Collector " Fowles but located in a plausible emotional and class drama. Some great politically incorrect side swipes at the teaching profession and Cate Blanchette and Dame Dench are superb. It revolves around a sexual relationship between a frustrated abnd beautiful Liberal bourgeois and the way a suppressed older lesbian uses her knowledge of it .
Fabulously creepy.
I `m talking to myself here aren’t I . Barbarians
This is a great film - my partner comes from the former East Germany and she and her family explain at great length about the little detail of life under the DDR. They always mention the coffee in the film and while life was hard I think some of her family miss the DDR. But some of them really don't miss the DDR.
The film doesn't really address the Stasi issue and the spying on neigbours/colleague/family well, but aside from that it is an accomplished film.
I am ashamed to say my German is rubbish and that without my partner I would be quite lost in Deutschland.
These film reviews are a good addition Iain. But I'd join the others and also reccomend the Lives of Others which is a really good examination of the secret police state in East Germany.
Considering this is your second nostalgia film related post in quick succession, and you've already told us you aren't working, do we expect more film reviews. If so, get Bobby out. I'd like to see what you think of this piece of political nostalgia...
If you would like more humourous films about the GDR, you could do a lot worse than watching Sonnenallee and Helden Wie Wir, as far as I know they weren't ever released in the UK so you can perfect your German all over again.
I lived in Jena, Thuringia for a year and there are still loads of middle-aged and higher, not too well off people who still misss the 'way things were'.
Of course, they're mad; but that's there perogative.
Anonymous, I wrote about BOBBY in March when I saw it on a plane.
http://iaindale.blogspot.com/2007/03/no-bobby-dazzler.html
I saw that film a while back - a nice Disneyfication of communism I thought!
I'm looking forward to some of the other warping of history that film makers are so good at.
Maybe we could have "The Pol Pot Years", a funny but emotional hunt for the skull of a favourite uncle!
my husband seems to believe I went into a coma in east germany before the wall came down and he has arranged so that whenever I switch on the TV there is some chap who has been chosen as next leader by a handful of party members and who goes on about the need for draconian police powers and internment which are needed to protect us from, well, I'm not sure what we are being protected from, my husband hasn't really thought out this man's back story very well. It's all very clever nevertheless so I just play along with it and pretend I don't realise it's a set up
Genosse! If you enjoyed that you would like "Herr Lehmann" (2003) a German film I saw on TV which covers the wall coming down from the perspective of the west Germans, it is dark, funny, well acted and has believable edge-of-society characters. I'm not German-fluent and I enjoyed it.
Ian have you tried 'The Edukators'? It stars Daniel Bruhl and it's directed by the same guy. Again it examines socialism but in a modern day context. Personally I think it is as good if not better than Goodbye Lenin.
Can't say my German is good enough to cope without sub-titles, but I would recommend Herzog's 'Aguirre, der Zorn Gottes' to anyone.
Great film. Its supposed to be a human, bitter sweet comedy chaps not a heavy political film. It works well on the level it sets itself.
Iain
Perhaps you should link to the IMDB first then Amazon at the end?
I went to see Goodbye Lenin in Brussels. For some reason, my then-girlfriend was convinced that the film had been dubbed into English.
I'd had quite a few to drink before the film and I'm not sure how much I caught between the German dialogue and the French and Dutch subtitles. My French is mediocre, German very poor and Dutch non-existent/
Iain, are you are aware of that power that your german fluency has over women...
Vor der 18 Doubty Street
vor dem grossen Tor
Stand eine Laterne,
und stebt noch davor
in the original German and no subtitles.
Es gibt auch Menschen in Deutschland die Untertitel brauchen wenn die Schweizer im Fernsehen erscheinen.
Just fascinating Iain, just fascinating
Does this holiday mean you are going to be blogging about your leisure activities for the next week then. ?
I know your dirty little secret Mr. Dale!
http://conservativemindblog.blogspot.com/2007/06/quote-of-day-562007-iain-dale-stasi-spy.html
Newmania - you're not talking to yourself, I read Notes on a Scandal, (free from the library) so don't need to pay to see it or hire it.
So when is Gordo going to re-issue the film under a different name.
All these recent Nanny/police-state proposals will look great when declaimed by the great leader from the top of Lenin's tomb. Putin might even lend him a missile or two to complete the scene.
I can make up for my grumpy old git comment after you praised The History Boys: I thought Goodbye Lenin was fantastic too.
And Newmania -- I haven't seen the film but I read Notes on a Scandal, I thought it one of the best novels I read that year, you get completely sucked into the mounting hysteria of the mad teacher - brilliant. So good to hear the film is good too.
It's gone all 'Newsnight Review' in here innit.
PS I thought 'Zodiac' was rubbish.
Smug twat!
Sadly I can't speak german, but I do think Germany has been producing some of the best films in Europe over the last few years. Three which I would particularly recommend are:
Große Mädchen weinen nicht ,
Das Experiment
Der Untergang .
Don't mention the war.... the cold war!
I liked Triumph of the Will.
The German version of the DVD is far superior to that of the subtitled UK version as it has lots of interesting DVD's. Whereabouts did you live in Deutschland Iain? I have German ancestory and family connections in various parts of the country.
Sorry - I mean the German version of the DVD has lots of interesting extras!
Anonymous, a year in Bad Wildungen and a year in a village called Besigheim, near Stuttgart.
Der Untergang .is tedious and repetitious ........
The German comedies are better which are being churned out in bucketloads with actors like Max Tidof, Thomas Heinze, and dishy women like Esther Schweins, Eva Maria Grein, Lisa Martinek,
Some really good German movies on Astra
a year in Bad Wildungen and a year in a village called Besigheim,
Bet you were the only person in town speaking Hochdeutsch
Achtung! Achtung! Synchronicity alert. Spent an hour this afternoon looking at "Do Not Refreeze" a touring exhibition of B&W photography from pre-freeze Berlin and GDR. May blog it later. It is recommended too.
Er, pre-thaw that is.
The references to Hochdeutch remind me:-
I was in a ski party in Austria and one of the group starting talking to the waitress. Another member of the group said to him, "you speak the language, then?".
He replied, "No, I speak High German".
Personally, I took the film as a simple comedy
I wrote a long, rambling analysis of the film on my blog:
http://thersiteswrites.blogspot.com/2006/06/good-bye-lenin-building-walls-again.html
I didn't find it funny: it's really about how one young man turns into a monster, just like East Germany itself. The Ostalgia comes with a barbed edge.
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