Grenzland

Voigt, a documentary filmmaker from the east of the Republic best known for his “Leipzig films”, travels along the border region between Germany, Poland and the Czech Republic. The protagonists he encounters speak for themselves and as well as for others who find themselves in a similar situation. As Voigt only listens and does not comment, those who are otherwise hardly listened to find an attentive ear. They speak of the past, of the ruptures in their lives, how their homeland has changed and of dreams that remained unfulfilled for some yet became a reality for others. Voigt encounters Karla again, with whom he spoke in 1992 in BORDERLAND – A JOURNEY, his first film about the region, about her work at the chemical factory VEB Chemiefaserwerk Guben and who now works in a casino in the west. He meets a Polish high school graduate who is preparing for her departure to study in England, talks to the granddaughter of a Greek refugee from the civil war in Poland and a Kurdish Syrian who is busy making Görlitz his new home. The picture, put together by mosaic stones of such different biographies, is multifaceted and colourful, yet also grey and dreary at times. Presumably everyone in the audience knows someone who could tell such a story in one way or another. DD