Aufenthaltserlaubnis

Forum Special Fiktionsbescheinigung 2023

Summer in West Berlin, in the late 1970s. Exiles from all over the world are dancing in the Tiergarten or playing football in front of the Bellevue Palace. They go to the municipal office and have their residence permits extended by a grumpy official; the passports are stamped in rhythmic fashion. They see their children’s photos in the passports and their children today, years older. A poem by Pablo Neruda is heard in voiceover: “Exile is round in shape/A circle, a ring./Your feet go in circles,/You cross land/And it is not your land.” They draw pictures of dictators on the way out on cardboard: Idi Amin of Uganda, Dimitrios Ioannidis of Greece, the Shah of Persia, General Franco of Spain and António Salazar of Portugal. When they hug their friends at Tegel airport who are travelling back to where they grew up, their joy knows no bounds.
But one dictator hasn’t been toppled yet. Augusto Pinochet’s military junta is still oppressing the filmmaker’s home country of Chile. He is already being carried through the streets of West Berlin as a cardboard cut-out though, a defiant hope to be fulfilled in 1990.

by Antonio Skármeta Federal Republic of Germany 1978 German, Spanish 12’ Colour

Crew

Director	Antonio Skármeta
Screenplay	Antonio Skármeta
Cinematography	Axel Brandt
Editing	Daglasa
Sound	Tuto
Production Manager	Helmut Wietz

Produced by

Common Film Produktion

Antonio Skármeta

Born in Antofagasta, Chile in 1940, he had to leave his homeland after the 1973 military putsch and lived in exile in West Berlin. There the writer wrote screenplays, including for Peter Lilienthal and Christian Ziewer, and made four films of his own, among them Mit brennender Geduld (1983). Its remake Il postino (1994) made the material and its author world famous. Antonio Skármeta returned to Chile in 1989. From 2000 to 2003, he served as Chile’s ambassador to Germany.

Filmography

1978 Aufenthaltserlaubnis; 25 min. 1983 Wenn wir zusammen lebten...; 99 min. · Ardiente paciencia (Mit brennender Geduld); 80 min. 1984 Abschied in Berlin; 66 min.

Bio- & filmography as of Berlinale 2023