Castles and Cottages

The Murderers Are Among Us

October 1946 •German

After returning from a concentration camp, Susanne finds an ex-soldier living in her apartment. Together the two try to move past their experiences during WWII.

2 or 3 Things I Know About Him

April 2005 •German

What would your family reminiscences about dad sound like if he had been an early supporter of Hitler’s, a leader of the notorious SA and the Third Reich’s minister in charge of Slovakia, including its Final Solution? Executed as a war criminal in 1947, Hanns Ludin left behind a grieving widow and six young children, the youngest of whom became a filmmaker. It's a fascinating, maddening, sometimes even humorous look at what the director calls "a typical German story." (Film Forum)

Vera – The Hard Way to Enlightenment

January 1989 •German

The story of Vera Lenz, a young and very attractive woman who is the daughter of a pastor and comes from a small coastal village on the North Sea (FRG). She is intelligent, determined, but also hungry for adventure, and she fascinates the world of men. She has developed into an accomplished secretary with excellent foreign language skills - predestined for an international career. Her meeting with Colonel Shelvin paves the way for this: Vera is able to take up a position at NATO headquarters in Brussels and, thanks to her achievements, she travels to many countries and meets countless interesting people.

The Good German

December 2006 •English

An American journalist arrives in Berlin just after the end of World War Two. He becomes involved in a murder mystery surrounding a dead GI who washes up at a lakeside mansion during the Potsdam negotiations between the Allied powers. Soon his investigation connects with his search for his married pre-war German lover.

Tommy

March 1975 •English

After a series of traumatic childhood events, a psychosomatically deaf, dumb and blind boy becomes a master pinball player and the object of a religious cult.

M/S Gustloff

March 2008 •German

Joseph Vilsmaier Two-part TV movie focuses on the tragic events surrounding the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff, a German passenger ship, at the end of World War II. On 30 January 1945, Captain Hellmuth Kehding was in charge of the ship, evacuating wounded soldiers and civilians trapped by the Red Army. Soon after leaving the harbor of Danzig, it was hit by three torpedoes from the Soviet submarine and sank in less than an hour.

Mona Lisa Smile

December 2003 •English

Katherine Watson is a recent UCLA graduate hired to teach art history at the prestigious all-female Wellesley College, in 1953. Determined to confront the outdated mores of society and the institution that embraces them, Katherine inspires her traditional students, including Betty and Joan, to challenge the lives they are expected to lead.

Der Untergang der Pamir

October 2006 •German

The story of the German sail-training ship Pamir that sunk in a hurricane.

Crime and Punishment

February 2002 •English

John Simm stars in this adaptation of Dostoyevsky's tragic masterpiece - a profound drama of redemption and a thrilling detective story of the soul.

Collin

December 1981 •German

Tales from the Madhouse

April 2000 •English

Set inside the crumbling walls of a dilapidated Victorian sanatorium, eight mysterious characters reveal their secret stories to the visiting camera. The eight are linked by one unifying and crucial event in their lives: each of them has had an encounter with Jesus of Nazareth in some way — an experience that has left an indelible mark.

The Assault

February 1986 •Dutch

At the end of WWII the Dutch resistance kills a German officer in front of the house of a Dutch family. Years after the war the young boy who witnessed the killing runs into the members of the resistance who committed the killing.

Kahlschlag

October 1993 •German

Robin is 16 and has had enough: permanent trouble at school and at home. On the run from his dull everyday life, he joins a group of skinheads. The clique strengthens their sense of belonging by beating up foreign youths. This is how the "apolitical" boy slips into the right-wing scene, and it's not easy to get out of it. When they injure a Turkish girl during a robbery, Robin, of all people, is questioned by the police.

Germany, Year Zero

December 1948 •Italian

In the ruins of post-WWII Berlin, a twelve-year-old boy is left to his own devices in order to help provide for his family.

Neger, Neger, Schornsteinfeger

October 2006 •German

This drama is based on the childhood memories of Hans Jürgen Massaquoi, who was one of the few black native Germans in Nazi Germany. In 1935 at the age of nine, he lives with his German mother in a small flat in Hamburg's working class district Barmbek, while his father and grandfather had left the country. Although the boy is not persecuted by the Nazis and dreams of joining the Hitler Youth, his skin color makes him a target for racist abuse...

Forbidden Games

May 1952 •French

Orphaned after a Nazi air raid, Paulette, a young Parisian girl, runs into Michel, an older peasant boy, and the two quickly become close. Together, they try to make sense of the chaotic and crumbling world around them, attempting to cope with death as they create a burial ground for Paulette's deceased pet dog. Eventually, however, Paulette's stay with Michel's family is threatened by the harsh realities of wartime.

Ashes and Diamonds

October 1958 •Polish

A young academy soldier, Maciek Chelmicki, is ordered to shoot the secretary of the KW PPR. A coincidence causes him to kill someone else. Meeting face to face with his victim, he gets a shock. He faces the necessity of repeating the assassination. He meets Krystyna, a girl working as a barmaid in the restaurant of the "Monopol" hotel. His affection for her makes him even more aware of the senselessness of killing at the end of the war. Loyalty to the oath he took, and thus the obligation to obey the order, tips the scales.

The Bastard

May 1978 •English

Phillipe Charboneau is the illegitimate son of an English duke. When he travels from France to England to claim his inheritance, he incurs the wrath of his father's family and is forced to flee to America, where he becomes involved in the events leading to the American Revolution. (Episodes 1 and 2 of the Kent Chronicles miniseries.)

Life in Kajzar

December 1952 •Slovenian

A post-WW2 story about the village largely involved in wine-making business. The peasants who claimed possessions of lands, woods, and churches after communist party seized the power hold a party where a member of so-called reactionary forces (kulaks, clergy and Axis collaborators) tries to break in and stop it.

Our Daily Bread

November 1949 •German

A story about a family after the Second World War. The petty bourgeois cashier Karl Weber of Berlin observes from a distance how his son Ernst participates in the building of a new socialist society. Karl does not understand Ernst's visions, instead he confides in his other son Harry. However, Harry becomes involved in illicit business and Karl quickly realizes that it would be best to join his son Ernst in the citizen-owned factory.