Morgen beginnt das Leben

Life Begins Tomorrow

Retrospective 2018

Musician Robert Sand is released from prison in April 1933, after serving five years for manslaughter. Disappointed not to find his wife Marie waiting for him outside the prison gates, he heads into the city. At the same time, Marie makes her way in the other direction. For one portentous day, they look for each other in the noisy city of Berlin. Doubt, mistrust, and jealousy begin to germinate in Robert’s breast … Made after the end of the Weimar Republic, Morgen beginnt das Leben is a swan song to the qualities of Weimar cinema. With minimal, often deliberately incomprehensible dialogue, Hochbaum’s film puts the focus on a visual experience. It is indebted to the tradition of films showing a cross-section of urban society; using documentary images, expressionist lighting, subjective camera angles, and experimental sound and picture montages, it traces a portrait of the metropolis, as well as the inner conflicts of its protagonist. But in the new dictatorial era, that had a price. In 1993, Karsten Witte wrote “the director, heir to the proletarian films of the Weimar Republic, depoliticised his methods to the same extent that he resurrected the rhetoric of the old avant-garde”.

by Werner Hochbaum
with Erich Haußmann, Hilde von Stolz, Harry Frank, Walter von Lennep, Edith Schollwer, Etta Klingenberg, Alfred Beierle, Gustav Püttjer Germany 1933 German 77’ Black/White

With

Erich Haußmann
Hilde von Stolz
Harry Frank
Walter von Lennep
Edith Schollwer
Etta Klingenberg
Alfred Beierle
Gustav Püttjer

Crew

Director	Werner Hochbaum
Screenplay	Carl Behr
Cinematography	Herbert Körner
Camera Assistant	Hermann Dey
Editing	Marianne Behr
Music	Hansom Milde-Meißner
Sound	Eugen Hrich
Set Construction	Gustav A. Knauer, Alexander Mügge
Make-Up	Richard Timm
Producer	Emil Unfried

Produced by

Ethos-Film GmbH

Additional information

Film Print: Bundesarchiv-Filmarchiv, Berlin

Werner Hochbaum

Filmography

Bio- & filmography as of Berlinale 2022