(Germany in Autumn, Susanne tanzt, The Tailor from Ulm, Zero Hour, TV: Heimat, Heimat 2, Heimat 3)
Cast:
Hermann Simon: Henry Arnold
Clarissa: Salome Kammer
Juan: Daniel Smith
Evelyne: Gisela Muller
Ansgar: Michael Seyfried
Helga: Noemi Steuer
Stefan: Frank Roth
The most detailed of Edgar Reitz's deeply personal trilogy of films about his
homeland, Heimat 2 feels just as fresh as when it was originally completed
and screened a dozen years back.
Neatly released on DVD just as Reitz gets a cinematic release for the third
of his Heimat cycle of epic films, we can luxuriate in this epic homage to the
sixties and to student life and self-expression.
Indeed, the word 'epic' hardly does justice to such an unflinching and detailed
document of one decade, unfolding as it does across a daunting seven subtitled
discs and over 25 hours. But if you get hooked and stick with it, the rewards
are enormous.
Rarely has such depth of characterisation been achieved in a television series,
but this is key to Reitz. He won't be hurried or nudged off course as he
explores the flowering, cynicism and empowerment of a generation through a handful
of key individuals, from poetess Helga to Chilean Juan, who speaks 10
languages 'including Esperanto'.
Each member of this loosely-connected group is seen through their relationship
with central character, Hermann Simon, the heartbroken, multi-talented musician
and budding composer who has fled his rural home and family in a determined
move to excise his past. He's also vowed that he'll never love again, which is
a bit of a drawback when he immediately falls for fellow music student and overachiever
Clarissa.
And while other contemporaneous events like the Berlin Wall's erection, Kennedy's
assassination and the rise of Willi Brandt and the infamous Baader-Meinhof gang
take place, Hermann and Clarissa's aching, overpowering and unrequited love
stretches across the entire decade and their own unsuccessful marriages to
other people.
Lovingly filmed in black and white, with judicious use of colour perhaps when
glancing something important through a doorway and for extended sequences at
night, Heimat 2 looks utterly sumptuous as it draws us into the everyday
life of these post-war German youths, some of whom are neatly experimenting
with capturing themselves on film - in new wave style, naturally.
Even as it reveals the hopes of this generation and their new freedoms, Heimat
2 also suggests these young people have a predetermined and inescapable fate
set before them.
Those who marvelled at the first Heimat will be able to catch up with what
happened to the young idealist Hermann, but you actually need no previous
knowledge of the series that bookend the self-contained Heimat 2 to identify
with the people and the plot.
You can see why this body of work was voted one of the best pieces of television -
indeed European film - ever made by everyone from the New York Times to
Corriere della Sera to the Radio Times.
In short, this is probably as close as television gets to pure poetry.
Note, also, that Heimat 3 is released in the UK on DVD in August 2005.
DVDs reviewed by the editor are watched on a Panasonic TXW32R4 32" widescreen TV
connected to either a Creative Dxr2 DVD-ROM player or Microsoft Xbox and
played through a Sony STR-DB930 amplifier.
PC games reviewed by the editor are on:
Since Nov 2005: Intel Pentium D 830 3.0Ghz, 1Gb RAM, 128Mb nVidia GeForce 6700XL, Windows XP
Since Aug 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.66Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb GeForce4 MX440 graphics, Windows XP
Since May 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.6Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb ATI Radeon 9600TX graphics, Windows XP
Since Jun 2002: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, 64Mb ATI Radeon 8500LE
Since May 2000: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, Voodoo 3 3000 AGP
