MDR

A lighthearted look at the opening of the border crossing of Bornholmer Straße in Berlin from the point of view of the confused border guards.

The young Friedrich Schiller begins his life as a poet with a dramatic escape. After the sensational success of his first drama "The Robbers", he deserts from the Duke's army. At the Mannheim Court and National Theatre, he initially receives a friendly reception, but his new play "Fiesko" is not well received by the artistic director Dalberg. In the successful actor and author August Wilhelm Iffland, Schiller finds a strong competitor for the position of in-house playwright and vies with him for the love of the same woman. The young poet's situation becomes increasingly precarious; he has no money, suffers from hunger and falls seriously ill. Nevertheless, he works feverishly for recognition and success with no regard for his own health.

In this docudrama Rosa von Praunheim looks into Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s sexual orientation, especially into his erotic experiences during his travels in Italy. Contrary to the common belief, von Praunheim argues that Goethe was not a heartbreaker and conqueror after all. It was only in Italy, that he had diverse sexual experiences, not least with men. Von Praunheim bases his assumption on letters written by Goethe to his friend Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi about these sexual encounters. Some of the content of these letters is re-encated in the film. At the same time, historians and linguists analyse and classify the letters into their historical context.

The film shows the apparently intact world of a middle class family, whose harmonious façade crumbles due to the unexpected visit of their relative Paul, a young man of 16 years. Paul arrives looking for love and support after the suicide of his father.

A 9th century woman of English extraction born in the German city of Ingelheim disguises herself as a man and rises through the Vatican ranks.

15-year-old Elise is longing for a happy family life, but her mother Betty is weak and egocentric. She drowns her problems in alcohol. Everything seems to turn out good when they meet Ludwig. But he does not fall in love with Betty, he loves Elise.

For 11-year-old Kattaka it's an escape: she's looking for her biological father, a Russian sailor whose ship is currently moored in Gdansk and whose existence her parents have kept secret until now. For 70-year-old Lena it's a journey back: back to her home in Masuren, from which she fled in the Second World War. And back to her suppressed pain of having lost both parents. Only together can the mismatched couple regain the ground beneath their feet, and themselves.

You left your home to move far away. You were struck by a wind of change and were unfaithful to yourself. You reinvented yourself and you are now feeling free. But suddenly pressure arises in you.

A therapist dies under mysterious circumstances. No one knows how or why. At the Russian-Jewish funeral service, his daughter, relatives and former patients gather to come to terms with the loss together. However, no one seems to have known the deceased well. The question increasingly arises as to who the guests are actually mourning: the deceased, their lost home or simply themselves?

Ralf and Bea Maurer's marriage has being decaying for a while. Ralf is 56, he is unemployed and has decided to retire. Bea, on the other hand, is still quite active and is starting to become unable to cope with the mask of soft middle age self-indulging with which Ralf is hiding himself. During a weekend spent in Brandenburg, two masked men assault the couple. As a result of the humiliation that follows this assault, Ralf is induced to take off his cover. By doing so he thinks he has faced the truth beneath his frustrations and salvaged his marriage. But it might be too late.

Eleven-year-old Linh shows great grace under pressure. When her mother, who’s raising her kids on her own, has to return unexpectedly to Vietnam, Linh looks after her little sister Tien and the family restaurant on her own. Of course, no one is supposed to find out, not the school, not the neighbours, and definitely not child protective services. But Linh’s biggest problem has red hair, a telescope and a sly grin: Pauline. The daredevil from across the street has the whole neighbourhood under surveillance and can’t imagine anything cooler than a life without parents. When Pauline blackmails the Vietnamese sisters into starting a gang with her, the three girls set off on a daring adventure.

Monique appears dressed up as Marilyn Monroe in the village disco NEW YORK. Her brother Rick thinks it's funny appearing as ladybug. But he ist the only one. It's going to be a fateful night...

In the Cold War years of the 1970s, an American patrol boat meets a Soviet ship off the east coast of the United States for talks about fishing rights in the Atlantic. In the midst of this, while Russian commanders are aboard the U.S. Coast Guard vessel where the talks are being held, a Lithuanian sailor jumps across the ten feet of icy water separating the boats. Crash-landing on the deck of the American ship, he desperately begs for asylum. Though they try, the Americans ultimately fail to provide protection and the Soviets are allowed to capture him and brutally return him to their vessel. Thus begins a stranger-than-fiction story of imprisonment, discovery, fame, and freedom. Through rare archival footage and a dramatic first-person re-enactment of that fateful day by Simas Kudirka, the would-be defector himself, this tale of one of the biggest Cold War muddles takes us on a journey of uncanny twists of fate, and the emotional sacrifices of becoming a universal symbol of freedom.

A former East German boxing champion reduced to working as a bouncer and debt collector is forced to reflect on his life when he is diagnosed with a fatal disease.

A Hungarian youth comes of age at Buchenwald during World War II. György Köves is 14, the son of a merchant who's sent to a forced labor camp. After his father's departure, György gets a job at a brickyard; his bus is stopped and its Jewish occupants sent to camps. There, György find camaraderie, suffering, cruelty, illness, and death. He hears advice on preserving one's dignity and self-esteem. He discovers hatred. If he does survive and returns to Budapest, what will he find? What is natural; what is it to be a Jew? Sepia, black and white, and color alternate to shade the mood.

Origin sticks like shit to your shoe! That's what Marlen Hobrack says, who grew up as a working-class child in Bautzen. But the promise of the old Federal Republic was that you can become anything if you just try hard enough. But that no longer applies. So is class in Germany fixed from birth? Have we long been living in a country in which origin and family background are more important for future prospects than individual performance and commitment? In Germany, it takes six generations to rise from poverty to the middle class, in Denmark only two generations. Those affected reflect on their life stories, the burden of their social origins, the wrong and right turning points for social advancement, as classified by social researchers. They talk of pride and shame, of financial hardship and wealth, of origin and future, of growing up and moving up in this Germany with its entrenched selection mechanisms for social advancement.

Mueller is a young and unsuccessful actor who has one big problem. He does not have time. He does not have time for his little daughter Elina and he does not have time for Petra who actually just wanted to make an interview with his room-mate Willy. Mueller is busy, always busy in every kind of situation. All his problems seemed to be solved when he realizes that Willy has invented a time-machine. Everything could be fine now, if just Mueller had listened better to Willy's warnings about the rules of time travelling.

The adolescent Milan discovers his own suspected homosexuality at the age of 17, and the consequences for him and his family, but also the liberation as he understands why he has been so down and rebellious.

It's a hot, dry summer in Klein-Schappleben. Micha, a pretentious video game designer, wants to turn his late parents' dilapidated guesthouse into a luxury hotel with a wellness oasis. The villagers are skeptical, even though Micha loudly promises new jobs and prosperity. But his plans start to falter when the groundwater in the village dries up.

In the aftermath of a tragic fire in a Romanian club, burn victims begin dying in hospitals from wounds that were not life threatening. A team of investigative journalists move into action uncovering the mass corruption of the health system and of the state institutions. Collective follows journalists, whistle blowers, and authorities alike. An immersive and uncompromising look into a dysfunctional system, exposing corruption, propaganda, and manipulation that nowadays affect not only Romania, but societies around the world.