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Documentary films on ruptures after 1989 – political, economic and private


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free admission
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German
Ground Floor, Hall 2
Belongs to: Transform!, Blown Away: The Palace of the Republic
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On the theme weekend “Transform!”, the Humboldt Forum will be showing a total of six documentary films over two days that take a closer look at the social upheaval of 1989/90. The two days will focus on different topics.

Saturday is dedicated to the Palace of the Republic as a place of remembrance. Based on this, three different points in the history of the Palace will be presented on film. Firstly, as the venue for the 40th anniversary celebrations, the building will become an important station in the Peaceful Revolution. Secondly, they can encounter the building in 1991, when it stood like a time capsule in the center of Berlin, which the new government did not quite know what to do with. Thirdly, they can get to know the building after the asbestos was removed, when it was used by artists and revisited by many old acquaintances. All three moments mark a break in the relatively short but extremely eventful history of the building.

On Sunday, 6 October, the film programme will focus on the political transformation of the GDR and the preparation and implementation of reunification. Many of the decisions that influenced the lives of the then 16 million inhabitants of the GDR were made in the Volkskammersaal of the Palace of the Republic. The documentary films are intended to shed light on the decisions and compromises that were made in favor of rapid accession to the FRG and how these affected the lives of the former GDR population. On three levels, the documentaries show examples of how reunification took shape – politically, economically and privately

Curated and hosted by Dominique Falentin

Programme

11:00-11:05 am

Welcome

11:05 am–12:35 pm

Die letzte DDR-Regierung oder wie man sich selbst abschafft (2018, 89:44 min.)

The documentary Die letzte DDR-Regierung oder wie man sich selbst abschafft (The last GDR government or how to abolish yourself) is about the eventful term of office of the new and last People’s Chamber of the GDR, which lasted just 173 days. A parliament founded by almost inexperienced politicians that, as the title suggests, aimed to dissolve itself. A novelty not only in German history. In a short space of time, 164 laws and 93 resolutions were passed that changed the lives of 17 million GDR citizens forever. The last representatives of the GDR report on how difficult the negotiations with each other and with the politicians from the West were, what everyday working life was like between excessive demands, economic pressure, public protests and the will to protect the rights of GDR citizens.

Director: Michael Erler

Interviews: Matthias Hoferichter, Ben Arnold, Fanny Heidenreich, Michael Schönherr

Camera and sound: Daniel Liepke

Editing: Steffen Werner

Mixing: Johannes Ramson

Narrator: Mirko Kasimir

Producer: Olaf Jacobs

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12:35–12:40 pm

Intermediate moderation

12:40–1:25 pm

D-Mark, Einheit, Vaterland – Das schwierige Erbe der Treuhand (2019, 44:54 min.)

The Treuhand – hardly any other term triggers stronger reactions in East Germany. For millions of East Germans, the change from a planned to a market economy meant a path to unemployment.

30 years after reunification, it is time to take stock. Birgit Breuel, the president of the Treuhandanstalt, drove the privatization and closure of thousands of companies. After decades of silence, she is now ready to reopen this chapter for the first time.

The film Einheit, D-Mark, Vaterland – Das schwierige Erbe der Treuhand (D-Mark, Unity, Fatherland – The difficult legacy of the Treuhand) by Inge Kloepfer and Jobst Knigge delves into the breathless years from 1990 to 1994 and sheds light on the background and consequences to this day. The outstanding work of the film team was honored with two awards in 2020: the 25th Helmut Schmidt Journalism Award and the Business Film Award, which is sponsored by the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy.

Director: Inge Klopefer / Jobst Knigge

Camera: Jan Kerhart, Stefan Paul

Sound: Jacob Schlesinger

Editing: Jakob Kastner

Speaker: Frank Köhler

Sound mixing: Andreas Weis

Production management: Evelyn Wenzel, Martin Krüppe

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1:25–1:30 pm

Intermediate moderation

1:30–1:58 pm

Bruderland ist abgebrannt (1991, 28 Min.)

Bruderland ist abgebrannt (Brotherland has burned down) is a half-hour film in which Vietnamese immigrants (former contract workers and students) from East Berlin are interviewed in the spring of 1991. The special social situation of the people, the racist violence of those years, invalidated state treaties, unemployment, self-organization and the bonus of around 3,000 DM offered by the German state at the time for immediate “voluntary” departure to Vietnam are discussed. The film shows examples of the rapid socio-political change at the time and the consequences of privatization. The people interviewed represent the Vietnamese minority that was little noticed by the public during the turmoil of the unification process, who left the GDR in the 1980s and now had practically no rights in the new Germany. They had no political representatives of their own and no lobby to stand up for their interests. It is therefore hardly surprising that the documentary was made on the film team’s own initiative without funding. It is a rare contemporary document that represents a marginalized community and brings their difficult living conditions to life in a snapshot.

This film is shown with English subtitles.

Director and writer: Angelika Nguyen

Camera: Dieter Chill

Editing: Sven Czimmek, Karl Sorge

Sound: Robert Henke

Production: Kerstin Leppin

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1:58–2:00 pm

Farewell


The curator

Dominique Falentin has been working at the Stiftung Humboldt Forum im Berliner Schloss since mid-2022. She is part of the curatorial exhibition team Blown Away: The Palace of the Republic and the associated program team. She is an art historian and has been in Berlin since 2012. She studied at Freie Universität, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin and Technische Universität Berlin. In 2019, she wrote her master’s thesis on the Palace of the Republic in the culture of remembrance and analyzed the topic on the basis of exhibitions which been showed in 2019.

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