Out of the Past - KVIFF 60/80 / Lissy / Germany 1957
“Here we have a film that has been made in the masterful grip of a young director,” Germany’s Hamburger Echo wrote in a review of Lissy, the first true classic by director Konrad Wolf. This still relevant story, based on the novel by Prague native Franz Carl Weiskopf, follows a young working-class woman who yearns for a better life, but her path toward this dream brings her uncomfortably close to the growing machinery of the Nazi regime. A fundamentally humanist drama with excellent cinematography by Werner Bergmann and a delicate, moving performance by Sonja Sutter in the title role, Lissy asks us to ponder what we are willing to ignore if we feel that we can benefit from it. Third Grand Prix in 1957.
Tomáš Hubáček
Film stills © DEFA Stiftung Rudolf Meister
89 min / Black & white, DCP
Director Konrad Wolf
/ Screenplay Alex Wedding (pseudonym for Grete Weiskopf) / Konrad Wolf
/ Dir. of Photography Werner Bergmann, Hans Heinrich
/ Music Joachim Werzlau
/ Sound Werner Klein
/ Editor Lena Neumann
/ Art Director Gerhard Helwig
/ Production DEFA
/ Cast Sonja Sutter, Horst Drinda, Hans-Peter Minetti, Kurt Oligmüller, Gerhard Bienert, Else Wolz, Raimund Schelcher, Christa Gottschalk
Konrad Wolf. Selected filmography: Lissy (1957), Stars (Sterne, 1959), Professor Mamlock (1961), I Was Nineteen (Ich war neunzehn, 1968), Goya or the Hard Path of Knowledge (Goya – oder der arge Weg der Erkenntnis, 1971), Solo Sunny (1980).
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