DEFA Film Screening: The Airship

When:
Wednesday, May 17, 2023 6:30p -
9:00p

Where:
Goethe-Institut Boston
170 Beacon Street
Boston, MA 02116

EventScheduled OfflineEventAttendanceMode

Admission:
FREE

Hosted by:
...
goethe_institut_boston Goethe-Institut Boston

Categories:
Meetup, Movies

Event website:
https://www.goethe.de/ins/us/en/sta/bos/ver.cfm?event_id=24583955

Franz Xaver Stannebein (Jörg Gudzuhn), a young boy at the turn of the century, wants nothing more than to fly. He carries this obsessive dream into adulthood as a merchant in Spain. One day, he meets German industrialists who want to fund his idea, but they ask him to build an airfield in Spain first. When the Nazis use his designed field during the Spanish Civil War, Stannebein feels betrayed. To register his complaint, he goes to Germany.


After World War II, Stannebein’s grandson searches for him, and the trail leads to an asylum. Director Rainer Simon brought together an exceptional team to create DEFA’s most unconventional film, including Lutz Dammbeck (animation) and Friedrich Goldmann (score).


Director: Rainer Simon

East-Germany 1982

116 min.

German with English subtitles


Admission is free, please register here.


There will be an introduction and Q&A with Mariana Ivanova. She is Associate Professor for German Film and Media and the Academic Director of the DEFA Film Library at UMass Amherst. Her scholarship focuses on twentieth and twenty-first century German and European cinemas and cultures, theories of transnational filmmaking and coproduction, artistic networks and cultural mediation. Ivanova’s 2019 monograph, Cinema of Collaboration: DEFA Coproductions and International Exchange in Cold War Europe, was finalist for the international Willy Hass award. She has published her research in several edited volumes about Central European cinema.



This film screening is part of the Goethe Institut's series HAPPY BIRTHDAY! THE DEFA FILM LIBRARY TURNS 30 that (re)discovers four film treasures from East Germany, followed by Q&A sessions with East German cinema experts. This year marks the 30th anniversary of the DEFA Film Library at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. After the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding on September 23, 1993, Prof. Barton Byg signed contracts with German partners that marked the official founding of the DEFA Film Library—the first and only archive and research center devoted to East German film culture outside Germany. In the three decades since, an enthusiastic team of faculty, staff and students has established the archive’s importance through groundbreaking film series, DVD and streaming releases, workshops, teaching guides and books. The biennial Summer Film Institutes hosted and organized by the DEFA Film Library have inspired new research trends in exploring East German film as part of German and international film history.


The DEFA Film Library has also been a close curatorial partner of the international network of the Goethe-Institutes, collaborating on numerous film series and events. We are happy to celebrate this special birthday here in Boston with a four-part film program that will bring together current and former members of the DEFA Film Library team to present and discuss lesser-known DEFA gems that are ripe for (re)discovery.

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05/17/2023 18:30:00 05/17/2023 21:00:00 America/New_York DEFA Film Screening: The Airship <p>Franz Xaver Stannebein (Jörg Gudzuhn), a young boy at the turn of the century, wants nothing more than to fly. He carries this obsessive dream into adulthood as a merchant in Spain. One day, he ...

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