Lars Barthel Movies
- 2001
Like many fathers and sons, Hans Canje and Ingo Hasselbach are at once strongly at odds and surprisingly similar. During World War II, Hans Canje was an enthusiastic member of the Hitler Youth, but after the end of the war, Canje met Kurt Goldstein, a Holocaust survivor and avid communist whose views had a powerful impact on Canje. Canje embraced communism, defected from West to East Germany during the height of the Cold War, and became a noted anti-fascist activist associated with the German Communist party. Like his father, Canje's son Ingo was also outspoken in his opposition to a divided Germany, but Ingo was a bitter opponent of communism, and out of disgust, changed his last name to Hasselbach. While Canje turned away from youthful Nazism, his rebellious son Hasselbach became the leader of an infamous neo-Nazi skinhead group and eventually spent time in prison for his terrorist activities. Today, Hasselbach claims to have renounced his Nazi views and is pursuing a career as an actor, while his father continues to write and edit an anti-fascist magazine. Lost Sons examines the strange and uncomfortable relationship between Canje and Hasselbach, who no longer speak to one another, as well as offering a glimpse of the many strange and seemingly contradictory paths German society and politics have taken in the wake of World War II. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Hans Canje
- 1996
British director Lindsey Merrison, anxious to learn more about the past her mother Sally so carefully concealed, takes her on a journey into her past in this German documentary. Lindsey did not discover that her mother was Anglo-Burmese, an immigrant to England in the late '50s, until she was an adult. Sally, ashamed of her heritage, cultivated a flawless English accent and always claimed to be born and raised in the solidly white-middle class Hemel Hempstead section of northwest London. Lindsey takes her mother back to Burma to learn more about her cultural heritage and to learn why her mother so desperately wanted to leave it behind. It will be the first time in 40 years that Sally and her brother Bill have seen their homeland. The documentary' title comes from George Orwell's novel Burmese Days. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- 1988
The late 1960s were times of generational conflict not only in the U.S., but in Germany and France as well. There, as in the U.S., the conflict tended to be between leftist youths and their more right-wing elders. In Germany, one of the heroes of the youth political movement was Rudi Dutschke (aka "Red Rudi"), who was assassinated in 1968. This documentary uses stock footage as well as interviews with family and associates in order to bring the times and its subject alive. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
