Verriegelte Zeit

Locked Up Time

Retrospective 2019

Quelle: Deutsche Kinemathek, © DEFA-Stiftung / Michael Löwenberg

In 1990, workers tore down the border post between East and West Germany at Wartha, built not too long before. It was here in 1985 that director Sibylle Schönemann crossed to the West under a system known as “amnesty”, by which the West bought the freedom of convicted East German criminals. One year previously, Schönemann had applied for an exit visa, which led to a prison sentence for “interfering with state activities”. In this documentary, she returns to the prisons where she was held, and documents her attempts to talk to the people involved in her case, including judges, jury members, prison officers, members of the Stasi secret police, her former boss, Hans Dieter Mäde of the state-run movie studio DEFA, and Wolfgang Vogel, the lawyer who arranged her release to West Germany. Not all of them are willing to talk … Schönemann takes an unequivocally subjective approach in laying bare the effects of the system; in dialogue with a fellow prisoner, she talks about the psychological pressure and trauma it produced. In disquieting encounters, her subjects accept no responsibility for the injustices they imposed, and the director is faced with the painful processing of the past.

by Sibylle Schönemann Germany 1991 German 94’ Black/White Documentary form | Film print: DEFA-Filmverleih in der Deutschen Kinemathek, Berlin Rating R0

Crew

Written and Directed by	Sibylle Schönemann
Script Adviser	Tamara Trampe, Hannes Schönemann
Cinematography	Thomas Plenert
Editing	Gudrun Steinbrück
Music	Tamás Kahane
Sound	Ronald Gohlke
Producers	Bernd Burkhardt, Alfred Hürmer

Additional information

Film print: DEFA-Filmverleih in der Deutschen Kinemathek, Berlin

Sibylle Schönemann

Born in Berlin in 1953. After studying directing at the Potsdam-Babelsberg Academy of Film and Television, she worked as an assistant director and dramaturge at the DEFA Studio for Feature Films. In 1984, she applied to leave the country. As a result, she was arrested by the Ministry for State Security and later ransomed. Her film Locked Up Time (1990) was awarded many prizes. Between 1987 and 1992, she worked as a dramaturge and script analyst for the Hamburg Filmbüro. Since 1991, she has been a freelance author and filmmaker. She has lived and worked in Potsdam again since 2006.

Filmography

1976 Kinder kriegen?; short film · Skizze über einen Clown; short film 1979 Manuela; short film 1980 Ramona 1990 Verriegelte Zeit (Locked Up Time); documentary 1992 Zwischen Himmelpfort und Fegefeuer; documentary 1993 Risse im Land; documentary 1995 Wenn Kinder zur Flasche greifen; documentary 1997 Diese Tage in Terezín (Those Days in Terezín); documentary 2002 Diagnose: Neurodermitis. Leben mit der Krankheit; documentary

Bio- & filmography as of Berlinale 2024