Memory of a Landscape - For Manuela
(Erinnerung an eine Landschaft – für Manuela)
Memories of a Landscape: To Manuela © DEFA-Stiftung
| Tetzlaff, Kurt |
| Niebelschütz, Joachim |
| Niebelschütz, Joachim |
| Porsche, Manfred |
| Farber, Karl |
| Geick, Eberhard |
| Rosenfeld, Gerhard |
| Kling, Ulrich |
| Sigmund, Joachim |
| DEFA Studio for Documentary Films |
Synopsis
This documentary tackles a difficult and politically sensitive East German environmental issue taking place in the early 1980s. South of Leipzig, villages are being demolished to make way for open-pit mining. For almost four years, the film crew follows two of these communities and, as the landscape changes, so do the lives of the people. It is a struggle for the older generation, in particular, to leave their familiar homes, but some of the younger people enjoy the unaccustomed comforts of newly-built apartment buildings.
This film calls on allegories about the loss of homeland and the destruction of nature in the name of progress and prosperity; the birth of baby Manuela represents the hope of a new beginning.
Commentary
Although the East German government introduced ambiguous environmental laws as of its founding in 1949, its ideals could not be fulfilled in tandem with the country’s economic growth plans and budget restrictions. Over the next decades, environmental problems increased to such an extent that the government classified all kinds of environmental data as “confidential” in 1972 and “secret” in 1982. At the end of the 1970s, the first grassroots environmental groups were founded, and the growing ecological movement became critical in drawing public attention to increasingly disastrous environmental problems. The activities of these groups were closely watched, infiltrated or stopped by the Stasi. In 1986, the Chernobyl nuclear disaster and the founding of the East Berlin Umweltbibliothek were turning points in the increasingly political environmental movement, which became a crucial player during the peaceful revolution of 1989.
The DEFA Studios produced many environmental films that followed the official party line. However, the growing public environmental awareness was also reflected in some films. Several documentaries, animation and feature films touched on environmental issues and questioned the officially promoted environmental situation. These films, especially the animation films, are sharp and satirical discussion of taboo topics, including forest damage and air and water pollution. Other films deal critically with problems caused by brown coal mining, including the resettling of villages. But these film projects were a red flag for the studio officials, and scripts and rough cuts went through extensive and complicated approvals.
Memory of a Landscape - For Manuela (1983, dir. Kurt Tetzlaff) tackles a difficult and politically sensitive East German environmental issue taking place in the late 1970s and early 1980s. South of Leipzig, villages are being demolished to make way for open-pit mining. For almost four years, the film crew follows two communities in Magdeborn and Bösdorf with about 3,000 citizens during their evacuation. As the landscape gets destroyed, so do the lives of the people. Particularly for the older generation, it is an emotional struggle to leave their homes, familiar places and their neighbors, getting uprooted and relocated to impersonal, uniform apartment buildings in Leipzig-Grünau.
In a 2018 interview with Tagesspiegel, Teztlaff remembered: "After finishing the film, the censors scheduled six internal screenings in which I was repeatedly asked to make revisions. In the long-term documentary, I observed and spoke to people who lived in the brown coal region […] Of course, their fears for the future were also addressed."
Ignoring the existing official taboo of public discussions about destructive environmental effects of brown coal mining in East Germany, the director was able to produce a unique insight into destroyed cultural landscapes, social changes and loss of home and longs-tanding traditions. Although the film premiered at the 1983 Leipzig International Documentary Film Festival and was released in cinemas three months later, it was mainly screened to a limited audience in film clubs.
Awards
| 2024 | Patagonia ECO Film Festival, Argentina |
| 2020 | Leipzig International Festival for Documentary and Animation Films |
| 2018 | Doc History:German Democratic Republic retrospective, Lussas, France |
| 1983 | Leipzig International Festival for Documentary and Animation Films |
Press comments
"An explosive cinematic parable on the loss of home and the destruction of nature in the name of industrial progress. Between 1979 and 1982, the village of Magdeborn, which is considered an obstacle to lignite mining in the south of Leipzig, is demolished. The locals were relocated to Grünau, Schönefeld and Borna, mostly against their will. The people portrayed in this cinematic requiem are outspoken when they describe themselves as victims and bargaining chips for the economic needs of the state. Officially, Tetzlaff and his team were accused of an unacceptable emotional closeness to the people." —Ralph Eue, DOK Leipzig, 2020
"[The film] depicts in a contrasting way how normality and a new beginning can somehow be found in the inevitable decline. At the beginning of the 1980s, the director succeeded in creating an exciting portrayal that still impresses today. At the time, however, there were only two broadcasts before the documentary disappeared into the film archives under pressure from the state." —Leipziger Zeitung
“The film reveals the alienation that displaced individuals feel in their replacement Heimat, the large conurbation of prefabricated tower blocks that are here unmistakably linked with the state’s urban planning policies. […] The film reminds the modern-day viewer that the regime’s efforts to foster an attachment to a GDR-Heimat were as un-successful as were its attempts to deny the population their inveterate Germanness.” —Nick Hodgin, Screening the East: Memory and Nostalgia in German Film since 1989
“Several villages near Leipzig have to make way for brown coal, an energy source of existential importance for the GDR. The film documents a period of almost four years in which old living environments, houses, farms, churches and cemeteries disappear and people find a new home: a compendium of light and dark motifs. Suggestive long shots and close-ups of an area transformed beyond recognition. 'The chronicle of events takes on a parable-like character: Right at the beginning, images of Manuela's birth and the demolition of the village church are mounted in parallel, and at the end there are scenes of the child's third birthday and of a young tree' (Elke Schieber). At the studio approval screening, officials confronted the DEFA film crew with the apprehension that Memories of a Landscape might perhaps be too depressing, because it paints an unvarnished picture of displacement and the loss of homeland. Director Kurt Tetzlaff argued in response that to him, in this case, demolition always also means a new start.” —rs, Zeughauskino, Deutsches Historisches Museum Berlin
“By 1989, the GDR had reached a production rate of 300 million tons of coal per year, a worldwide that has not been beaten to this day. This made an enormous impact on the cultural landscape south of Leipzig as well. Until the mid-1970s, “only” smaller towns were affected; but from 1977 to 1981 and 1984 to 1986, respectively, it was the end for Magdeborn (Espenhain coal mine) and Eythra/Bösdorf (Zwenkau coal mine), both towns of around 3,000 inhabitants. In the midst of these developments, a remarkable documentary, especially for the time, was created. Over years, director Kurt Tetzlaff accompanied these two towns through their downfall. He shows the painful separation of people from their familiar places, which will vanish. The film is a document of social changes that is dedicated to Manuela, the last child born in Magdeborn, in memory of her ancestors’ landscape.” —globaLE-Leipzig.de
