Pola Kinski Movies
- 2006
Wir werden uns wiederseh'n (AKA So Long!, 2006), marks the second major feature length film from German directors Oliver Paulus and Stefan Hillebrand after their acclaimed 2003 effort, Wenn Der Richtige Kommt (AKA When the Right Man Comes Along). Wir warden unfolds in a nursing home; it thus enters a territory rarely explored within the context of a dramatic, narrative feature, and rarely visited by anyone in the daily world, outside of patients, relatives, and employees. The central story charts the day-to-day experiences of three employees who sign on to work at the facility, on a full-time basis. The workers must learn surmount the regular fears and concerns associated with their jobs, gradually recognizing that a fear of death cannot help but also imply a fear of life.
~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Tom Jahn, Pola Kinski, (more)
- 1989
This somber drama from director Margit Czenki draws from her experience in serving a five-year prison term for armed robbery. The main heroine spends weeks in solitary confinement, then encounters the typical dangers of being with other women behind bars. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Pola Kinski, Therese Affolter, (more)
- 1981
Alexander is a young boy at the crossroads of manhood, faced with a single mother whose time is taken up finishing her degree, studying, and pursuing her own relationships. The boy has no one to turn to for life's more important questions. He puts an ad in the paper asking for someone to be his friend and "stand by him," an ad that does not do much to improve his situation with his mother. Eventually, he comes across a young girl about his age, and between the two of them, they tackle a few of the mysteries about growing up - not the least of which involve questions on sex and relationships, a theme that recurs throughout this story. Meanwhile, Alexander's mother needs to come to grips with what it means to be a real parent. This film, like the protagonists, seems to be caught between adulthood and childhood, with a foot in both camps, not standing solidly in either. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Angelica Domröse, Dietrich Mattausch, (more)
- 1981
This incisive film, an example of New German Cinema, is a wry and witty, biting and bitter take on the lives of a group of East German refugees in West Berlin at the end of the 1970's. Both the director Juergen Klauss, and the four principal actors in the film are East Germans who have gone through the same pains of adjustment that are confronted in the film. The story contrasts the experience of its central character, Max Rand (Stefan Staudinger), who arrives on an exit-visa and is really interested in going to the Maldive Islands, with seven roommates who long to go to West Berlin to "get a life." After they arrive, the roommates are supported by welfare and quartered in a condemned building, almost a symbol for their own fate. One roommate wants to enroll in the university to get a good education, only to find there are no openings available. All the compelling life quests, worthy of the time they spent in prison and this exile, crumble in the harsh reality of West Berlin with its different culture and political system. The roommates have to settle for jobs far below anyone's ideal, such as taking care of circus animals or working in a Peep Show, and that indignity exacerbates their loss of identity. As they straddle East and West German systems, trying to cope, some of the roommates just cannot make it. One becomes a terrorist, living constantly with the threat of capture and imprisonment, another commits suicide. In contrast, Max Rand may be politically unconscious - or simply much more aware, or both - but he goes through no soul-searching dilemmas. The ending of his story is quite different than that of the seven others. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Pola Kinski
- 1980
Framed as the memories of a young schoolgirl in a small German village, this realistic, harrowing drama focuses on the lives of the girl and her acquaintances during World War II. She and her friends of varying ages come up against the harsh cruelties of war in several shattering experiences. One of them is almost raped by a bitter and disfigured soldier, another makes a suicide pact with her lover, a professed Nazi is sent home from the war as a paraplegic, while a young man against the Nazis is among those killed in a bombing raid. The inhumanity of war is not confined to physical wounds, violent death, or rape; the drama goes on to paint twisted psyches that have been bent by unholy circumstances. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Erika Pluhar
- 1979
Valeska Gert was a young actress and dancer in 1920's Berlin. At that time, she created a sensation with her highly athletic stile of dance. In her 70s, she made a number of films, including one for Volker Schlondorff, Coup de Grace. The stories she told about theater in Berlin in the '20s inspired Schlondorff to make this short documentary. Valeska's dances are re-created for the screen by Pola Kinski, and her sharp-tongued reminiscences betray little reverence for sacred cows such as Marlene Dietrich or Conrad Veidt. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Pola Kinski
- 1978
In the years immediately following World War II, chaos and violence touched the lives of many Germans. In this story, Anna (Pola Kinski) has been damaged by some such incident. Nonetheless, she is able to fall in love with a German-born American member of the Occupation Forces, Colonel Stone (Mel Ferrer). Later, she marries Alfons Eichmayr, and finds her life narrowing unbearably. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Mel Ferrer, Pola Kinski, (more)
- 1977
As they attempt to neutralize a large cache of dynamite trapped in a mine as a result of a natural catastrophe, tensions between the miners and their bosses escalate and nearly explode. The miners have many old grudges and grievances based on the neglect and abuse of the owners, and the current dangerous task serves to ignite the fire of their anger. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Franz Buchrieser, Pola Kinski, (more)
