Life and Death Under Communism
Films that take place in communist countries, showing the reality of life there. There are just a few of these "Hollywood's missing movies":
http://reason.com/archives/2000/06/01/hollywoods-missing-movies
Suggestions welcome!
http://reason.com/archives/2000/06/01/hollywoods-missing-movies
Suggestions welcome!
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- DirectorRoland JofféStarsSam WaterstonHaing S. NgorJohn MalkovichA journalist is trapped in Cambodia during tyrant Pol Pot's bloody 'Year Zero' cleansing campaign, which claimed the lives of two million 'undesirable' civilians.
- DirectorAndrzej WajdaStarsAndrzej ChyraMaja OstaszewskaArtur ZmijewskiAn examination of the Soviet slaughter of thousands of Polish officers and citizens in the Katyn forest in 1940.
- DirectorPhilip KaufmanStarsDaniel Day-LewisJuliette BinocheLena OlinCentral Europe, 1968: A Czech doctor with an active sex life meets a woman who wants monogamy, and then the Soviet invasion further disrupts their lives.
- DirectorAndy GarciaStarsAndy GarciaInés SastreBill MurrayA wealthy Havana club owner and his family are torn apart by the violent sociopolitical upheaval brought about by the transition from the dictatorial regime of Batista to the Marxist revolution led by Fidel Castro in 1950s Cuba.
- DirectorWarren BeattyStarsWarren BeattyDiane KeatonEdward HerrmannA radical American journalist becomes involved with the Communist revolution in Russia, and hopes to bring its spirit and idealism to the United States.
- DirectorGoffredo AlessandriniStarsFosco GiachettiAlida ValliRossano BrazziThe time is the Russian Revolution. The place is a country burdened with fear - the midnight knock at the door, the bread hidden against famine, the haunted eyes of the fleeing, the grublike fat of the appeasers and oppressors. In a bitter struggle of the individual against the collective, three people stand forth with the mark of the unconquered in their bearing: Kira, who wants to be a builder, and the two men who love her - Leo, an aristocrat, and Andrei, a Communist. In their tensely dramatic story, Ayn Rand shows what the theories of Communism mean in practice. We the Living is not a story of politics but of the men and women who have to struggle for existence behind the Red banners and slogans. It is a picture of what dictatorship - of any kind - does to human beings, what kind of men are able to survive, and which of them remain as the ultimate winners. What happens to the defiant ones? What happens to those who succumb? Who are the winners in this conflict? Against a vivid panorama of political revolution and personal revolt, Ayn Rand offers an answer that challenges the modern conscience.
- DirectorAndrey SmirnovStarsDarya EkamasovaNina RuslanovaVladislav AbashinA chronicle of the life of an illiterate Russian peasant woman between 1909 and 1921, focusing on her private life and major historic events in the country.
- StarsValeriy GarkalinZhanna EppleValeri PoroshinThe film is set in the late 1940s - early 1950s of the XX century. It was a time of cruel and incompetent ideological interference in Soviet science, the suppression of everything reasonable and progressive - in particular, in genetics and breeding, a time when scientists often had to choose between an honest name and life. The hero of the film, faced with such a choice, only miraculously manages to escape from the massacre.
- DirectorFlorian Henckel von DonnersmarckStarsUlrich MüheMartina GedeckSebastian KochIn 1984 East Berlin, an agent of the secret police conducting surveillance on a writer and his lover finds himself becoming increasingly absorbed by their lives.
- DirectorDavid LeanStarsOmar SharifJulie ChristieGeraldine ChaplinThe life of a Russian physician and poet who, although married to another, falls in love with a political activist's wife and experiences hardship during World War I and then the October Revolution.
- DirectorRoland Suso RichterStarsHeino FerchNicolette KrebitzSebastian KochDuring the Cold War, Germany was divided into two states - East and West. This epic story tells about their dramatic connections.
- DirectorPaul FeigStarsBen TibberJim CaviezelJoan PlowrightA twelve-year-old boy escapes from a Bulgarian Communist concentration camp and sets out on a journey to reach Denmark.
- StarsEvgeniy MironovDmitriy PevtsovSergey KaryakinThe film takes place in the USSR in 1949. In the Marfino sharashka near Moscow, convict scientists are working on the order of Stalin himself - a secret telephony apparatus.
- DirectorAleksandr RogozhkinStarsIgor SergeevAleksey PoluyanMikhail VasserbaumDepiction of "troika" type of mass murder trials and it's influence on those who carried out plans to mass murder million of people. Somehow Russia was able to produce such movie, which easily could be documentary about actual events.
- DirectorCasper WredeStarsTom CourtenayEspen SkjønbergAlf MallandIvan Denisovich Shukhov has been sentenced to a camp in the Soviet gulag system. He was accused of becoming a spy after being captured briefly by the Germans as a prisoner of war during World War II. He is innocent, but is sentenced to ten years in a forced labor camp. The day begins with Shukhov waking up sick. For waking late, he is forced to clean the guardhouse, but this is a comparatively minor punishment. When Shukhov is finally able to leave the guardhouse, he goes to the dispensary to report his illness. It is relatively late in the morning by this time, however, so the orderly is unable to exempt any more workers and Shukhov must work. Based on the life of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn.
- DirectorAndrey KonchalovskiyStarsTom HulceLolita DavidovichAleksandr ZbruevThe true story of Ivan Sanchin, the KGB officer who was Stalin's private film projectionist from 1939 until the dictator's death. Told from Sanchin's view, the sympathetic but tragically flawed hero maintains unwavering faith in his "Master" despite the arrest of his neighbors and his involvement with their daughter, his wife's affair with the chilling State Security chief Lavrentii Beria and her tragic decline, and the deadly political machinations within the Kremlin he witnesses firsthand.
- DirectorFrank PiersonStarsChristopher JonesPia DegermarkRalph RichardsonFrom the John le Carré novel about a British spy who sends a Polish defector to East Germany to verify missile sites.
- DirectorNikita MikhalkovStarsNikita MikhalkovIngeborga DapkunaiteOleg MenshikovIn the USSR in 1936, shadows of Stalin's repressions fall on a famous, revolutionary hero. The accusations of him being a foreign spy are nonsense, and everyone knows that. However, a slow process of his downfall has already started.
- DirectorElia KazanStarsFredric MarchTerry MooreGloria GrahameA Czech circus owner/clown and his entire troupe employ a daring stratagem in order to escape en masse from behind the iron curtain.
- DirectorIvan PasserStarsRobert DuvallJulia OrmondMaximilian SchellThe life and career of the brutal Soviet dictator, Joseph Stalin.
- DirectorTomás Gutiérrez AleaJuan Carlos TabíoStarsCarlos CruzMirta IbarraJorge PerugorríaIt is a satire about life in Cuba. The members of a funeral procession and some truck drivers who need to take the same route begin to talk about God and the world and they end up discovering that life for both groups has many similarities and many differences, depending on the point of view.
- DirectorPavel ChukhrayStarsVladimir MashkovYekaterina RednikovaMikhail FilipchukA woman meets a man who isn't the right man for her - but she hasn't realised it yet...
- DirectorDelbert MannStarsJohn HurtJane AlexanderDoug McKeonTrue tale about two men planning to escape from communist East Germany in a hot air balloon, but only if they can take their families with them.
- DirectorYimou ZhangStarsYou GeGong LiBen NiuAfter Fugui and Jiazhen lose their personal fortunes, they raise a family and survive difficult cultural changes during 1940s to 1970s China.
- DirectorPeter WeirStarsJim SturgessEd HarrisColin FarrellSiberian gulag escapees travel four thousand miles by foot to freedom in India.
- DirectorTengiz AbuladzeStarsAvtandil MakharadzeZeinab BotsvadzeIa NinidzeVarlam, the despotic mayor of a small town, dies. After his funeral, his body is repeatedly unearthed and buried again. Through flashbacks and dreamlike scenes, we witness his rise, power and ambiguities.
- DirectorRégis WargnierStarsOleg MenshikovSandrine BonnaireCatherine DeneuveIn June 1946, Stalin invites the Russian exiled from the 1917 Revolution to return home. When the ships comes ashore in Odessa, the passengers are divided in two groups and one of them is executed. Among the survivors are Dr. Aleksei Golovin, his French wife Marie and their young son. Marie is accused to be a spy, her French passport is torn up and Aleksei accepts to move to Kyiv with his family to save her. They are sent to a room in a communal house and soon Marie befriends the super, an old woman who speaks French. But she is denounced and killed by the government agents. Marie feels guilty and brings her grandson Sasha Vasilyev, who will be evicted, to live in her room with her family. Marie wants to return to her family in France, but Aleksei explains that they are imprisoned in Russia. Marie tries a contact with the leftist French actress Gabrielle Develay to ask for help to leave the USSR. While Marie gets distant from her husband, she gets closer to Sacha, who is a great swimmer and the only chance to Marie contact her family.
- DirectorWaris HusseinStarsJohn SavageWillie NelsonFrancesca AnnisVictor and his family moved to the USSR in the mid '30's. When he refused to sign his skydiving accomplishment as a citizen of the USSR, he was not tried but simply sent to prison. His horrific imprisonment, beating and torture culminated with his being sent to the Gulag for many years. He was in the Soviet Union, according to the film, for a total of 45 years.
- DirectorJaromil JiresStarsJosef SomrJana DítetováLudek MunzarIn the 1950's, Ludvik Jahn was expelled from the Communist Party and the University by his fellow students, because of a politically incorrect note he sent to his girlfriend. Fifteen years later, he tries to get his revenge by seducing Helena, the wife of one of his accusers.
- DirectorBobby LeighStarsJim HendersonBobby LeighJonny LewisIn 1932-33, Ukraine, the breadbasket of Europe, had bountiful crops of grain, yet its people were dying of starvation. In order to crush the will of the independent-minded Ukrainian peasants and secure collectivization of all Ukrainian lands, Joseph Stalin ordered an army of ruthless, Communist Party activists to confiscate all harvested grain and seize all the foodstuffs in the villages. As a result of this genocidal decree, by the end of 1933 nearly 25 percent of the Ukrainian population - up to 10 million people, including 3 million children - had perished! In the face of terror, Ukrainians had little possibility of escaping their horrific fate to create another life elsewhere. Travel was banned for Ukrainians keeping them confined in a prison of starvation within their own villages.
- DirectorLewis MilestoneStarsAnne BaxterDana AndrewsWalter HustonA Ukrainian village must suddenly contend with the German invasion of June 1941.
- DirectorMichael CurtizStarsWalter HustonAnn HardingOscar HomolkaAmbassador Joseph Davies is sent by FDR to Russia to learn about the Soviet system and returns to America as an advocate of Stalinism.
- DirectorY. David ChungMatt DibbleThe documentary tells the story of the Koryo Saram, Koreans deported to Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan by Stalin from the far east of the Soviet Union.
- DirectorGeorge SidneyStarsWalter PidgeonEthel BarrymorePeter LawfordShortly after the end of World War II, British Colonel Michael S. "Hooky" Nicobar (Walter Pidgeon) is assigned to a unit in the British Zone of Vienna. His duty is to aid the Soviet authorities to repatriate citizens of the Soviet Union, many of whom prefer not to return to their home country. Billeted in the convent run by Mother Auxilia (Ethel Barrymore), Nicobar, and his military aides Major John "Twingo" McPhimister (Peter Lawford) and Audrey Quail (Dame Angela Lansbury), become involved in the plight of young ballerina Olga Alexandrova (Janet Leigh), who is trying to avoid being returned to Moscow. Nicobar's sense of duty is tested as he sees first hand the plight of the people he is helping return to the Soviet Union; his lack of religious faith is also shaken by his contact with the Mother Superior.
- DirectorJulian SchnabelStarsJavier BardemJohnny DeppOlatz López GarmendiaThe life of Cuban poet and novelist, Reinaldo Arenas.
- DirectorAleksey UchitelStarsVladimir MashkovAnjorka StrechelYuliya PeresildIn 1945, Soviet war hero Ignat is sent to work as a locomotive mechanic in a Siberian labor camp where he meets an assortment of Germans and Russians.
- DirectorPawel PawlikowskiStarsAgata KuleszaAgata TrzebuchowskaDawid OgrodnikA novice nun about to take her vows uncovers a family secret dating back to the German occupation.
- DirectorEvan GoldbergSeth RogenStarsJames FrancoSeth RogenRandall ParkDave Skylark and his producer Aaron Rapaport run the celebrity tabloid show "Skylark Tonight". When they land an interview with a surprise fan, North Korean dictator Jong-Un Kim, they are recruited by the CIA to assassinate him.
- DirectorCristian MungiuStarsAnamaria MarincaLaura VasiliuVlad IvanovA woman assists her friend in arranging an illegal abortion in 1980s Romania.
- DirectorHanno HöferRazvan MarculescuCristian MungiuStarsDiana CavalliotiRadu IacobanVlad IvanovSeveral urban legends of Communist Romania are dramatized.
- DirectorHoratiu MalaeleStarsMeda Andreea VictorAlexandru PotoceanValentin TeodosiuIn a small isolated village, in 1953, a wedding is interrupted by the news about the death of Stalin. Because any public celebration is forbidden, they decide to turn the happy event into a silent wedding.
- DirectorCorneliu PorumboiuStarsMircea AndreescuTeodor CorbanIon SapdaruA local talk show host organizes an alcoholic professor and a pensioner known for playing Santa Claus to decide whether there was ever a revolution in their town Vaslui.
- DirectorCãtãlin MitulescuStarsDorotheea PetreTimotei DumaIoan AlbuIn Communist-era Romania, people live with hope for a new life of freedom.
- DirectorStere GuleaStarsOana PelleaDan ConduracheMara GrigoreInspired by the overthrow of the Ceausescu regime in Romania, this novelistic feature examines the questions of a society after a revolution has happened, such as guilt and atonement and the anxiety that former conditions might come back again.
- DirectorNicolae MargineanuStarsRemus MargineanuValentin VoicilaDorel Visan'Someplace in the East' is among the first movies made in Romania after the fall of the Communism, dealing with one of the troubled period at the beginning of the Communist rule in Romania. It describes the forced expropriation of land by the Communists and the formation of the Communist farms, which was a real tragic episode in the Romanian history.
- DirectorBen LewisStarsMikhail GorbachevVáclav HavelWojciech JaruzelskiGeorge Orwell wrote that in a repressive political system every joke is a "tiny revolution." Jokes were an essential part of the communist experience because the monopoly of state power meant that any act of non-conformity, down to a simple turn of phrase, could be construed as a form of dissent. By the same token, a joke about any facet of life became a joke about communism. Hammer and Tickle recounts a humorous history of the Soviet Union and its satellite states through the jokes that flourished under the oppressive regimes in Russia and parts of Central and Eastern Europe. Jokes, the film contends, were a language of truth under Communism; a language that allowed people to navigate the disconnect between propaganda and reality and provided a means of resisting the system despite the absence of free speech. Using animated sequences, manipulated archival footage, and sketches to resurrect the jokes, the film offers an ironic take on the history of Communism while simultaneously investigating the social and political impact of jokes under Soviet rule. Interviews with Solidarity leader and former Polish president Lech Walesa, hard-line Polish leader General Jaroszelski, German actor Peter Sodann, German satirist and author Ernst Roehl, East German newspaper editor and Politburo member Guenter Schabowski, and academics Christie Davies and Roy Medvedev address the role that jokes played in challenging and weakening the Communist system from the inside even as joke-tellers faced censure or time in the Gulag for voicing their humor. Light and irreverent in its tone, Hammer and Tickle is really about the ultimate seriousness of joking and the use of the power of laughter to overcome hardship. This history of humor under the Soviet regime offers a direct, incontrovertible way to understand what it was like living in a Communist society, and is also proof that the human spirit can never be broken.
- DirectorRobert SiodmakStarsDon MurrayChristine KaufmannWerner KlempererIn 1962, a group of East Berliners escapes to West Berlin through a tunnel dug from the basement of a house located near the Berlin Wall.
- DirectorRichard MichaelsStarsRichard ThomasHorst BuchholzJosé FerrerIn Berlin in 1961, an American soldier and a German engineer join forces to build a tunnel under the Berlin Wall in order to smuggle out refugees, including the soldier's East German girlfriend.
- DirectorVitaliy ManskiyStarsLee Zin-MiYu-YongHye-YongA propaganda documentary about North Korea that reveals a few hidden facts because the director continues filming between the scripted scenes.
- DirectorArmando IannucciStarsSteve BuscemiSimon Russell BealeJeffrey TamborMoscow, 1953. After being in power for nearly 30 years, Soviet dictator, Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin, takes ill and quickly dies. Now the members of the Council of Ministers scramble for power.
- DirectorAngelina JolieStarsSareum Srey MochPhoeung KompheakSveng SocheataCambodian author and human rights activist Loung Ung recounts the horrors she suffered as a child under the rule of the deadly Khmer Rouge.
- StarsFlorian LukasJörg HartmannUwe KockischThe lives of two families in East Berlin between 1980 and 1990 as the era of communist DDR slowly comes to an end.
- CreatorAnna WingerJörg WingerStarsJonas NayMaria SchraderUlrich NoethenMartin Rauch is recruited by the HVA to infiltrate the West Germany army. As a rookie spy, his decisions constantly put his cover at risk and force his agency to take extreme measures.
- DirectorWolfgang BeckerStarsDaniel BrühlKatrin SassChulpan KhamatovaIn 1990, to protect his fragile mother from a fatal shock after a long coma, a young man must keep her from learning that her beloved nation of East Germany as she knew it has disappeared.
- DirectorPawel PawlikowskiStarsJoanna KuligTomasz KotBorys SzycIn the 1950s, a music director falls in love with a singer and tries to persuade her to flee communist Poland for France.
- DirectorChris GerolmoStarsStephen ReaDonald SutherlandMax von SydowDuring the 1980s, Soviet authorities hunt for a serial killer who picks his victims in railway stations and commuter trains and lures them into the woods.
- DirectorVít OlmerStarsJan PotmesilVeronika JeníkováJosef NedorostIn Prague, a young man from Mladá Boleslav joins a criminal gang and adapts to the environment of big money, debauched parties, prostitutes, and police raids.
- DirectorKarel KachynaStarsJirina BohdalováRadoslav BrzobohatýGustav OpocenskýAfter coming home from a Party gathering one night, a Czech official becomes convinced that he is about to be the subject of a political purge and tries to do damage control, while also dealing with his turbulent marriage.
- DirectorAgnieszka HollandStarsJames NortonVanessa KirbyPeter SarsgaardA Welsh journalist breaks the news in the western media of the famine in Ukraine in the early 1930s.
- DirectorPéter BacsóStarsFerenc KállaiLajos ÖzeZoltán FábriBanned for over a decade for its outspoken criticism of the post-WWII communist regime in Hungary, Péter Bacsó's 'The Witness' has since then achieved unparalleled cult status in its native land. Known as the best satire about communism, 'The Witness' has become a cult classic, which was also well received by critics and general audiences alike when it was finally released outside of Hungary. Its candid and realistic portrayal of the incompetent communist regime has earned great acclaim for both the director and the film itself when it was shown at Cannes Film Festival in 1981. 'The Witness' takes place during the height of the Rákosi Era, which was closely modeled after the ruthless and brutal Stalin regime. The film follows the life of an ordinary dike keeper, József Pelikán, who has been caught for illegally slaughtering his pig, Dezsõ. Instead of doing hard time for his "heinous" crime, Pelikán is elevated into an important position, generally reserved for the communist elite. Of course, Pelikán is utterly clueless about his newfound luck, not to mention his new job. Even his new benefactor, the mysterious Comrade Virág, is reluctant to reveal the real reason behind Pelikán's preferential treatment. Thus, begins Pelikán's hilarious adventure deep within the "sophisticated" communist society. One failure after another the incompetent Pelikán is elevated higher and higher on the communist echelon, all the while remaining completely clueless about his promotions. Until one day, when he gets called for to return the "favour" by falsely testifying against his long-time friend in a mock-up show trial.
- DirectorColin K. GrayStarsViktor AgeyevAntal BolváriJános BükA documentary on the 1956 Olympic semifinal water polo match between Hungary and Russia. Held in Australia, the match occurred as Russian forces were in Budapest, stomping out a popular revolt.
- DirectorKrisztina GodaStarsKata DobóIván FenyöSándor CsányiAt the 1956 Olympic Games in Melbourne, the Hungarian water polo team faces off against the Russians in what will become known as one of the bloodiest matches in the sport's history.
- DirectorKároly MakkStarsLili DarvasMari TörőcsikIván DarvasThe wife of a political prisoner tends to her mother-in-law and keeps from the old woman the truth about her son, whom she believes is in New York making a film.
- DirectorAndor SzilágyiStarsPéter FancsikaiMaia MorgensternGergõ BárdiAt 15 he and his family became victims of state terror. At 16 he became a freedom fighter to participate in the 1956 Revolution against Soviet oppression. At 17 he is betrayed and arrested by the dreaded Secret Police (AVH). Now he has to spend the remainder of his life in a political prison, called Hell's Hallway, to reach the legal age of 18 before his death penalty can be carried out. Peter Mansfeld was 18 when he was unjustly executed by the totalitarian regime of Hungary. Today he is remembered as one of the national heroes of Hungary.
- DirectorPéter GothárStarsAnikó IvánIstván ZnamenákPéter GálfyA teenager boy has to grow up in the shifting political and moral landscape of post-1956 Hungary.
- DirectorMárta MészárosStarsZsuzsa CzinkócziJan NowickiTamás VégváriDirect follow-up to "Diary for my lovers". Juli and the people who she knew throughout her life have to face the events of the 1956 failed revolution in Hungary.
- DirectorJoanna Cristina NelsonStarsGabriel AgüeroMoisés BerroteránJuliana CuervosRoberto is a middle-class working professional trying to survive Venezuela's economic death spiral and current humanitarian crisis while maintaining his unemployed mother. An argument breaks out when she asks him to buy flour for her birthday cake and he reprimands her for not being resourceful with what he provides. In an effort to make amends, he resorts to the black market to buy the scarce food item. But before heading back home he is faced with a moral dilemma.
- DirectorAntti-Jussi AnnilaStarsTommi KorpelaSidse Babett KnudsenHannu-Pekka BjörkmanOne night of 1930, nationalist thugs violently abduct Ketola from his home in Finland. Beaten and forced to walk the Eternal Road towards a foreign Soviet Russia, his only dream is to return to his family cost it what it may.
- StarsChulpan KhamatovaAleksandr SirinRamil SabitovA screen version of the best-selling novel by Guzel Yakhina. The year is 1930. In a small Tatar village, a woman named Zuleikha watches as her husband is murdered by communists. Zuleikha herself is sent into exile, enduring a horrendous train journey to a remote spot on the Angara River in Siberia. Conditions in the camp are tough, and many of her group do not survive the first difficult winter. As she gradually settles into a routine, Zuleikha starts to get to know her companions. The eclectic group includes a rather dotty doctor, an artist who paints on the sly, and Ignatov, Zuleikha's husband's killer.
- DirectorStanislaw BarejaStarsStanislaw TymBarbara BurskaChristine PaulThe main character is the manager of a sport club, nicknamed "Teddy Bear" by his friends and acquaintances. One day he is detained at the border just as his sport team is off to a tournament - somebody has torn out a few pages from his passport. It occurs to him that perhaps his ex-wife has done so to get her hands on their joint account in a London bank. Therefore, he has to get to London as soon as possible in order to transfer the money to a different bank. The solution is a movie, made by his friend. The script requires a double role, thus the search for a character is announced. The double has to apply for the passport, and that is solved through a girlfriend who agrees to play dope's new fiancée. At the engagement party he is slipped a drug, and Teddy Bear runs off to the airport with the false passport. On the plane, however, he meets his ex-wife...
- DirectorMichael HerbigStarsFriedrich MückeKaroline SchuchDavid KrossEast Germany, 1979. After initially failing to flee from the East to the West in a self-built hot-air balloon, two families struggle to make a second attempt, while the East German State Police are chasing them.
- DirectorLars KraumeStarsLeonard ScheicherTom GramenzLena KlenkeA group of twelfth-grade pupils in East Germany decide to show their solidarity with the victims of the 1956 Hungarian uprising by staging two minutes of silence during lessons.
- DirectorBernd BöhlichStarsAlexandra Maria LaraRobert StadloberStefan KurtAfter her return from a Russian Gulag, Antonia is forced to keep her horrible experiences secret in favor of the new socialistic GDR. When she can't conceal the past despite much effort, her newly regained freedom is taken away once again.
- DirectorFrancis MeletzkyStarsJörg SchüttaufJosefine PreußJacob MatschenzBerlin 1989, shortly before the fall of the Wall: While the actor Otto is rehearsing for his role as head of state and party leader Erich Honecker, the regime is fighting for survival. The military and police are preparing to use force to crush the Leipzig Monday demonstration in the evening. To protect his pregnant daughter Anne, who wants to get forged papers for her escape from the republic in Leipzig, of all days, Otto comes up with a daring plan: disguised as Honecker, he wants to withdraw the order to shoot. The opportunity is good because the real head of state is out hunting all day. Others also want to use his absence: Crown Prince Krenz and Stasi chief Mielke, who are secretly preparing a change of power in the Central Committee. The putschists are all the more astonished when they suddenly see Honecker in front of them. Otto plays the role of his life - but unfortunately the unexpected appearance of Margot, the secret ruler of the workers 'and peasants' state, thwarted his plans at the last minute. Meanwhile, the Stasi is on the heels of his daughter and her contact August, who is secretly filming for western television. And Anne has someone else on her cheek: her jealous friend Matti. He wants to dissuade her from her escape plans - and above all to pull away from August.
- DirectorPeter KahaneStarsKurt NaumannRita FeldmeierJudith RichterThe architect Daniel Brenner is in his late thirties when he receives his first challenging and lucrative commission: to design a cultural center for a satellite town in East-Berlin. He accepts the offer under the condition that he gets to choose who he works with. This way, he reunites with former colleagues and friends - most of them architects or students of architecture who have since chosen a different profession due to personal restraint or economic confinement. Together, they develop a concept which they hope will be more appealing to the public than the conventional and dull constructions common to the German Democratic Republic. However, their ambitious plans are once and again foiled by their conservative supervisors. As frustration grows, Daniel has trouble keeping his career in balance with his family-life: his wife Wanda wants to leave for West-Germany.
- StarsGötz GeorgeMarlen DiekhoffMartina GedeckSchulz and Schulz series.
- DirectorChristian PetzoldStarsNina HossRonald ZehrfeldRainer BockA doctor working in 1980s East Germany finds herself banished to a small country hospital.
- DirectorToke Constantin HebbelnStarsAlexander FehlingAugust DiehlRonald ZehrfeldThe dream of two young men to become sailors collides with the harsh realities of life in East Germany.
- DirectorFriedemann FrommStarsHenriette ConfuriusKatja FlintEdgar SelgeDuring the Cold War, Ulrich and Heike Molitor's attempt to escape from the GDR with their children hidden in the car ends in a prison conviction and both kids going to adoption unless they accept to leave daughter Rebecca behind to that fate and choose 'exulsion' with son Klaus. When the kids near adulthood, Klaus is frustrated that his parents only wine about his lost sister. Meanwhile, the time is ripening for the Berlin wall to come down. Rebecca's adoptive pa resists his wife's bitching to leave the Stasi.
- DirectorMads BrüggerStarsUlrich Løvenskjold LarsenMads BrüggerAlejandro Cao de Benos de Les y PérezA real-life undercover thriller about two ordinary men who embark on an outrageously dangerous ten-year mission to penetrate the world's most secretive and brutal dictatorship: North Korea.
- DirectorMiguel AlexandreStarsVeronica FerresPeter KremerFilip PeetersBased on a true story, Miguel Alexandre's two-part drama focuses on a East German woman and the fight for her children. Spring 1982: Sara Bender, living with her daughters Silvia and Sabine in the East German town of Erfurt, wants to marry her colleague Peter, but shortly before the wedding, her father is killed in a road accident. As the funeral takes place in West Germany, she isn't allowed to go there, so she starts planning to leave her communist home country forever. Trying to flee via Romania, she is caught by the secret service. After years in jail, Sara is ransomed by the West German government, but without her daughters. To draw the world's attention on her desperate situation, she starts demonstrating at the Berlin border crossing Checkpoint Charlie...
- DirectorConnie WalterStarsAnna BertheauAntonio WannekTim SanderGermany 1982: The country is divided into two parts. Nele, coming from West-Germany, travels to East-Germany where she meets Captain, singer of a band. They fall in love with each other, but the regime "takes care" of their relationship, meaning: They cannot see each other again. Germany 1990: The country is reunited. Nele searches for her lost love.
- DirectorMartin ScorseseStarsTenzin Thuthob TsarongGyurme TethongTulku Jamyang Kunga TenzinFrom childhood to adulthood, Tibet's fourteenth Dalai Lama deals with Chinese oppression and other problems.
- DirectorFred SchepisiStarsSean ConneryMichelle PfeifferRoy ScheiderA British publisher is sent a manuscript detailing Soviet Union nuclear missile capabilities. British Intelligence intercept it and recruit him to investigate the author's editor, a beautiful Russian woman he claims never to have met.
- DirectorJ. Lee ThompsonStarsGregory PeckAnne HeywoodArthur HillDuring the Chinese Cultural Revolution, the US government sends a scientist to China to steal the formula for a new agricultural enzyme developed by the Chinese.
- DirectorBernardo BertolucciStarsJohn LoneJoan ChenPeter O'TooleBernardo Bertolucci's Oscar-winning dramatisation of the life story of China's last emperor, Pu Yi.