DE
Undine rescues a prince from drowning, and leaves him unconscious on shore, where he can be found, but she has already fallen in love with him. Unable to enjoy life below the waves, the mermaid makes a deal with the Sea Witch to become human. The mermaid must also give her voice as payment. And her humanity is only conditional: if she can make the prince fall in love with her and marry her, she can gain a share in his soul and be truly human, but if he marries another, she will die at the next sunrise. It turns out that the witch only made her believe she would die if the prince married another as a Secret Test of Character: by refusing to kill the prince even to save her own life, she proves that she already has a soul. So she remains human, gets her voice back, and sets out to explore the world.
Dec 2013
The relationship between Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, the great German writer, and Christiane Vulpius, a village girl, is one of the instantaneous and fiery passion. They lived together for 28 years, 18 of these living in sin, 10 a married couple. Christiane's rival, Charlotte von Stein, a former favorite of Goethe, begins plotting and scheming against her. Christiane puts up with countless insults and humiliations like having to 'disappear' with their son into the servants' quarters and to stay at home on official occasions. Goethe marries her when she saves his life during an attack by plundering Napoleonic soldiers. Her new social position as Goethe's wife is resented and envied by all. When she is openly attacked by the snooty, jealous people, Goethe is only half-hearted in coming to her defence. But she stays with him for he is her great love, even when she turns to the charms of many youthful admirers...
May 1999
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.
May 2016
In 1989, thirteen GDR scientists and technicians set off from East Berlin to the Georg Forster research station in the Antarctic. During their expedition the Berlin Wall fell on November 9th. Cut off from the images that go around the world, the men can only experience the historical events passively. When they returned in the spring of 1991, their homeland was a foreign country. The documentary reconstructs the thoughts and feelings of the East German researchers on the basis of eyewitness accounts, diary excerpts, letters, film material, grandiose landscape shots from the location of the action and unique photos to make the consequences of the events tens of thousands of kilometers away on the small GDR expedition in the middle of the eternal ice tangible.
Oct 2020
Rita Vogt is a radical West German terrorist who abandons the revolution and settles in East Germany with a new identity provided by the East German secret service. She lives in constant fear of having her cover blown, which unavoidably happens after the German re-unification.
Sep 2000
A poor peasant woman lives in a cabin in the woods. She grows two rose-trees in front of her house, one with white roses and one with red. When the flowers bloomed she had two children, both girls. She named them both after the trees, Snow White and Rose Red respectively. They have an adventure involving a bad dwarf and a bewitched bear.
Dec 2012
Primary school teacher Sabine Schuster suffers a sudden stroke during a theatre rehearsal with her pupils. Doctors are able to save her life in hospital, but the path back to everyday life is difficult and uncertain. For Sabine's husband Stefan, a forester, nothing is as it was either. While Sabine has to laboriously relearn things that are taken for granted, such as speaking or walking, in rehab, Stefan adapts the house in Ilmenau, Thuringia, to his wife's needs in the hope that the familiar surroundings will do her good. But Sabine is so disappointed by her condition that she initially resists everything that will help her recover. Out of shame, she avoids contact with her usual surroundings. She misses her work as a teacher and hiking. Seemingly lost in the mill of the care system, the new nurse Iryna, organized by Stefan, brings new hope with her very own, optimistic and demanding manner.
Oct 2024
Leipzig, December 1734: Christmas brings the Bach family together. The first snow has fallen and the children Gottfried and Elisabeth are delighted about the arrival of their older brothers Friedemann and Emanuel. The Thomaskantor has retired to his music room. Anna Magdalena supports her husband, as there are only a few days left and his latest work, the six-part "Christmas Oratorio", must be finished on time. It is awaited with suspicion by the city council and the gentlemen of the consistory, who have long found Bach's waywardness a thorn in their side and fear that, after the premiere of the St. Matthew Passion a few years earlier, the St. Thomas Church will once again be filled with "operatic" music. With the oratorio, Johann Sebastian Bach hopes that he will finally become court composer in Dresden. And, as always, he demands that all members of the family join forces to help him. But differences of opinion are increasingly delaying the completion of Bach's most famous work.
Johannes Breutigam, a successful architect, is confronted with his real life on a New Year's Eve. His wife is cheating on him, his partner Losfeld has betrayed him and his company is on the verge of bankruptcy. Deeply depressed and desperate, he rents a hotel room on the 32nd floor. He writes a farewell letter to his wife and opens the window to jump into the depths. A young woman is standing on the window sill next door, apparently up to the same thing. With the promise to spend the last evening of the year with her, he manages to save her and himself for the time being. This is the beginning of a strange, romantic, comical story that takes place on a single New Year's Eve and in which two people change their lives
Jan 1999
Each night, like every other child in the world, Miko goes to Dreamland thanks to magic sand dispersed by the Sandman. But one night, the evil dream Habumar steals the Sand of Dreams and takes control of Dreamland. The Sandman and his faithful sheep Neopomuk ask Miko to help them get back the precious sand, and to hence foil the plans of terrifying Habumar. So begins a great adventure in a world where all is possible.
Sep 2010
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.
Oct 2012
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.
Oct 2009
In this German political drama, an ex-Stasi agent encounters an old friend whom he may have betrayed after his friend tried to escape East Germany. The former East German agent is Otto Skrodt who after many years is about to be promoted in the highest government ranks. He is anxious to maintain a squeaky clean image. His daughter is Isabelle. The young and friendly Kalle returns after spending many years in jail for his escape attempts. He doesn't know exactly who blew the whistle, but his friend Skrodt is definitely under suspicion. Kalle returns to ostensibly renew the friendship and to see Isabelle whom he loves. The duplicitous friendship between the two men becomes the main focus of the story which features interesting plot twists at the end.
Feb 1994
In love with a girl that smells of oranges while in a complicated relationship with his father, Darek is gentle, strong and devoted to his little sister and their herd of horses. Darek's world is a story about the joy and pain of growing up in the isolated yet beautiful Lusatian Mountains. Here, horses are not expensive specimens of racing stables but beings you should care for and love. Not even that is enough in life though, as Darek finds out nearing the Summer's end, closing his childhood definitely. However, just like any ending, this is a start of something new.
May 2019
Docudrama about life, career and breakdown of Erich Mielke, the former Security chief of East Germany.
Nov 2015
While life in a provincial town in eastern Germany near the Polish border has virtually come to a standstill, a dynamic young entrepreneur, his wife, and a laconic, resigned dropout strive to make a new start. But their dreams of revitalizing the region with a train station bistro and spa business fade away in (self-)deception, hangovers, and small escapes.
Oct 1997
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?
May 2017
A dream becomes a nightmare: Shortly after the Iranian doctor Murath Tehrani and his German wife Claudia moved into a chic villa on the outskirts of Leipzig, threatening couple flutter into the house and Claudia is harassed by anonymous callers with xenophobic slogans. First, the woman tries to hide the threat from her husband. But not even the police can help her. Suddenly, every stranger approaching the house appears as a threat. Psychological pressure is also increasing the pressure on the harmonious marriage of the young couple. But Murath and Claudia are unwilling to be driven out of their homes by aggressive racists.
Mar 1994
November 9, 1989, the day the Berlin Wall came down. A 10-year-old girl and her friends attempt to use their teleportation device to beam her uncle back to East Germany but instead, as they witness on TV, end up beaming everyone in their town into West Germany! They have to race against time to undo the experiment before the nasty border guards open fire...
Oct 2013
"Kruso" tells of the last summer before the Wall came down on the small island of Hiddensee in the Baltic Sea. Beyond state-organized tourism, the isolated island became a kind of artist colony every year and a place of longing for dropouts and alternatives. Due to its proximity to Denmark, Hiddensee was also the starting point for the flight across the Baltic Sea.
Jun 2018