East German Cinema

12/21/2025

Did East Germans celebrate Christmas? Of course, they did! Here are five Christmas-themed films from East Germany.

For those who grew up in the West, it often comes as a surprise to learn that East Germans celebrated Christmas. After all, wasn’t it a communist country, and didn’t Karl Marx say, “Religion is the…

10/06/2025

We extended our mini-virtual film series, THE EARLY FILMS OF KONRAD WOLF, including three films by the filmmaker, due to high demand to October 10, 2025. Link in bio; use password GSA2025.

09/09/2025

Free screening of whisper & SHOUT (flüstern & SCHREIEN) at the San Francisco Goethe Institut this Thursday (September 11)! If you haven't been to the Goethe Insitiut in a while, it has moved to 657 Howard Street, around the corner from SFMOMA. This is a documentary about the rock scene in East Germany before the fall of the Berlin Wall (der Mauerfall). See what future members of Rammstein were up to back then. It requires signing up with Eventbrite, but the tickets are free.

Free Filmscreening of a documentary about the underground music-scene in the former GDR (East Germany)

08/25/2025

As most of you know, I had stopped posting regularly on the East German Cinema Blog a while back due to a shortage of East German films being released with English subtitles and the difficulty in finding films to review in either language. During this time, I put together my book, MOVIES BEHIND THE WALL. I’m happy to report that, during my hiatus, the DEFA Library at UMass Amherst has been busy. They’ve released several more movies, including Konrad Wolf’s rarely seen adaptation of THE LITTLE PRINCE. As has always been the case, some of their choices of films to subtitle baffle the hell out of me, but I welcome any additions to the catalogue. This means it’s time to fire up the old Erika (just kidding, I use Google Docs) and start adding new films to the blog. I’ve also noticed that many of the links are now broken (particularly on the buying and streaming links), so I will be fixing those as well.

In other news, several people have said to me that they’d love to buy my book, but they refuse to patronize Amazon. I can understand this. Does Jeff Bezos really need any more money? I’m currently looking into other publishing outlets. I’ll most likely go with IngramSpark, which has the advantage of selling through bookstores. If anyone has a better idea, let me know.

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08/13/2025

If you haven't read it, this is an excellent book. It presents a far more nuanced picture of the fall of the Wall than we were presented with here in the States (the real Tal der Ahnungslosen), and it's well written. If you have any interest in East Germany, you need to read this one.

In 1990, a country disappeared. When the Iron Curtain fell, East Germany ceased to be. For over forty years, from the ruin of the Second World War to the cusp of a new millennium, the German Democratic Republic presented a radically different Germany than what had come before and what exist...

12/06/2024

The East German Cinema Blog got listed here as one of the 10 best German Movie blogs and I didn’t have to pay for the privilege. Win! 🏆 👍🏻

10 Best German Movie Blogs ⋅ 1. Berlin International Film Festival ⋅ 2. Movie Pilot ⋅ 3. Filmfest-Muenchen ⋅ 4. Film Portal ⋅ 5. German Films ⋅ 6. German Films Blog ⋅ 7. Constantin Film Blog

10/03/2024

Kleo, on Netflix, is a fun show. It seems to have been made by someone with more than a passing knowledge of East Germany. It also features songs from the era, such as "Nie Zuvor" by Electra and "Aufruhr In Den Augen" by Pankow.

04/27/2024

Here's an article I wrote for a different website, but I thought it might be of interest to the folks here. A comparison between the Hollywood and East German film versions of a popular play.

Note: This article originally appeared on a site devoted to comparing two different versions of the same story. I decided to discontinue the site because the amount of work that went into the artic…

01/07/2024

Yes, there is such a thing as East German Noir.

Before I get too far into this article, I should point out that one’s opinion of what constitutes film noir is a highly subjective one. For some, the only films that qualify are those that contain …

12/18/2023

Here's a little Christmas gift. There aren't a lot of Christmas movies from DEFA, but that doesn't mean there weren't any.

For those who grew up in the West, it often comes as a surprise to learn that East Germans celebrated Christmas. After all, wasn’t it a communist country and didn’t Karl Marx say “Religion is the o…

12/10/2023

I've gathered several of the better Indian films into one article on the subject. I apologize in advance for all the footnotes.

The American West is about as far from East Germany as one can get, politically, geographically, and philosophically, but Germans have a long—some might say bizarre—love affair with America’s past,…

11/24/2023

I've decided to start posting links to different sub-genres and categories on the East German Cinema Blog. I'm including links to the previous articles where applicable. This category is my personal favorite.

I have a love/hate relationship with movie listicles. Don’t we all? On one hand, it seems like a facile way to discuss films. They are rarely more than thumbnails with no depth or examination…