Film Festival is over

“Barbara” Written and Directed by: Christian Petzold

I have a great love for almost all German films and this is no different. Nina Hoss plays Barbara a doctor who after filling for a visa to leave East Germany banished to a small town. She is constantly being spied on and searched. She has a boyfriend who is helping plot her escape. Barbara although much resistant creates relationships with her boss, André (Ronald Zehrfeld), and a patient, Stella (Jasna Fritzi Bauer). All of the actors are fantastic in portraying their characters and you really relate to all of them, even the cold Barbara and the man spying on her. Everyone has the assumption that a film about East Germany is one that will obviously be sad, or at least I do. I was pleased to find that this was not the case. It did not portray East Germany as the best place to be, but it finally was a place with real people. They were happy and sad, and of course upset about being spied on. But it was not simply a film that said everyone in East Germany suffered 24/7. It was a real film about real people. I would definitely recommend it.