BALLOON
****
Director: Michael Bully Herbig
Screenwriters: Michael Bully Herbig, Thilo Röscheisen and Kit Hopkins.
Principal cast:
Friedrich Mücke
Karoline Schuch
David Kross
Alicia von Rittberg
Thomas Kretschmann
Jonas Holdenrieder
Country: Germany
Classification: M
Runtime: 125 mins.
Australian release date: 31 October 2019
Previewed at: Verona Cinema, Sydney, on 31 October 2019.
The extraordinary true story of this hard-to-believe 1979 escape from East Germany has been told on film before, in Disney’s Night Crossing in 1982, but now it is getting a less saccharine treatment in the German feature Balloon. Directed by Michael Bully Herbig, who co-wrote the script, it’s a gripping retelling of the incredible events surrounding the flight of two families from the GDR 10 years before the Berlin Wall came down. The literal flight, that is - they flew over the border in a handmade hot air balloon! Herbig has been asked why he wanted to relate this tale now and he answered, “Of course I asked myself if there would be any point to tell a story on the big screen that had already been a film at the beginning of the eighties. But the longer I talked to the … families and the more details became known from the Stasi files, the more I felt reassured that making the film from Germany for an international audience was the right thing [to do].” It was an interesting choice for ‘Bully’, as he is widely known in Germany, because he is a highly popular comedian who hosted a satirical sketch show on television called Bullyparade for many years and who directs and writes comedies usually starring himself. He has also appeared in many comedic films helmed by other directors.
On 16 September 1979, the Strelzyk and Wetzel families, made up of four adults and four children aged between two and 15, set off from East Germany (the German Democratic Republic, as it was officially known) with the hope of flying over the border into Bavaria. It was the culmination of 18-months’ work and their second attempt and tensions were running high. Because of the failure of their first effort, the secret police (the Stasi) were on to their plan and they were aware that the net was closing in on them. Peter Strelzyk (Friedrich Mücke) and Günter Wetzel (David Kross, seen in The Keeper earlier this year) were friends from work who together hatched the concept of flying over the border, initially intending to build a small plane or helicopter. Peter was an electrician who’d previously worked for the East German Air Force and Günter was a brickie who just happened to be a dab hand with a sewing machine. When they hit upon the idea to construct a hot-air balloon, their skills were perfectly matched for the task.
Herbig treats Balloon in a straight-forward, matter-of-fact way; let’s face it, a story as unusual as this is not in need of any embellishment or directorial tricks. If anything, the script has underplayed some of the extraordinary events - in real life, for example, there were three balloons made, not just the two we see in the film. Yes, okay, the tension has been amped up to 10 by foreshortening the period of time covered and some of the close-calls have been heightened for dramatic effect but these things serve the drama well. It was, indeed, a life and death situation. Border guards were under strict orders to shoot to kill if anyone attempting to escape couldn’t be captured. As the film reveals, it was a matter of national pride to the GDR authorities that no-one should successfully leave the country alive.
The performances are uniformly good, particularly Thomas Kretschmann as Lieutenant-Colonel Seidel, the Stasi officer who is relentless in his pursuit of the plotters, and the two younger members of the Strelzyk family, Frank (Jonas Holdenrieder) and ‘Fitscher’ (Tilman Döbler), who are both somewhat conflicted about leaving - the older one because of love and the younger because of fear. Torsten Breuer’s cinematography is excellent, achieving the director’s intention of not showing East Germany in the dismal and colourless images that usually depict life in the East before the ‘fall of the Wall.’ Marvin Miller and Ralf Wengenmayr share the credit for the terrific music in Balloon, which manages to be both thrilling and beautiful. This is a tense story of incredible bravery, one that isn’t diminished by knowing that the families successfully made it to the West.
Screenwriters: Michael Bully Herbig, Thilo Röscheisen and Kit Hopkins.
Principal cast:
Friedrich Mücke
Karoline Schuch
David Kross
Alicia von Rittberg
Thomas Kretschmann
Jonas Holdenrieder
Country: Germany
Classification: M
Runtime: 125 mins.
Australian release date: 31 October 2019
Previewed at: Verona Cinema, Sydney, on 31 October 2019.
The extraordinary true story of this hard-to-believe 1979 escape from East Germany has been told on film before, in Disney’s Night Crossing in 1982, but now it is getting a less saccharine treatment in the German feature Balloon. Directed by Michael Bully Herbig, who co-wrote the script, it’s a gripping retelling of the incredible events surrounding the flight of two families from the GDR 10 years before the Berlin Wall came down. The literal flight, that is - they flew over the border in a handmade hot air balloon! Herbig has been asked why he wanted to relate this tale now and he answered, “Of course I asked myself if there would be any point to tell a story on the big screen that had already been a film at the beginning of the eighties. But the longer I talked to the … families and the more details became known from the Stasi files, the more I felt reassured that making the film from Germany for an international audience was the right thing [to do].” It was an interesting choice for ‘Bully’, as he is widely known in Germany, because he is a highly popular comedian who hosted a satirical sketch show on television called Bullyparade for many years and who directs and writes comedies usually starring himself. He has also appeared in many comedic films helmed by other directors.
On 16 September 1979, the Strelzyk and Wetzel families, made up of four adults and four children aged between two and 15, set off from East Germany (the German Democratic Republic, as it was officially known) with the hope of flying over the border into Bavaria. It was the culmination of 18-months’ work and their second attempt and tensions were running high. Because of the failure of their first effort, the secret police (the Stasi) were on to their plan and they were aware that the net was closing in on them. Peter Strelzyk (Friedrich Mücke) and Günter Wetzel (David Kross, seen in The Keeper earlier this year) were friends from work who together hatched the concept of flying over the border, initially intending to build a small plane or helicopter. Peter was an electrician who’d previously worked for the East German Air Force and Günter was a brickie who just happened to be a dab hand with a sewing machine. When they hit upon the idea to construct a hot-air balloon, their skills were perfectly matched for the task.
Herbig treats Balloon in a straight-forward, matter-of-fact way; let’s face it, a story as unusual as this is not in need of any embellishment or directorial tricks. If anything, the script has underplayed some of the extraordinary events - in real life, for example, there were three balloons made, not just the two we see in the film. Yes, okay, the tension has been amped up to 10 by foreshortening the period of time covered and some of the close-calls have been heightened for dramatic effect but these things serve the drama well. It was, indeed, a life and death situation. Border guards were under strict orders to shoot to kill if anyone attempting to escape couldn’t be captured. As the film reveals, it was a matter of national pride to the GDR authorities that no-one should successfully leave the country alive.
The performances are uniformly good, particularly Thomas Kretschmann as Lieutenant-Colonel Seidel, the Stasi officer who is relentless in his pursuit of the plotters, and the two younger members of the Strelzyk family, Frank (Jonas Holdenrieder) and ‘Fitscher’ (Tilman Döbler), who are both somewhat conflicted about leaving - the older one because of love and the younger because of fear. Torsten Breuer’s cinematography is excellent, achieving the director’s intention of not showing East Germany in the dismal and colourless images that usually depict life in the East before the ‘fall of the Wall.’ Marvin Miller and Ralf Wengenmayr share the credit for the terrific music in Balloon, which manages to be both thrilling and beautiful. This is a tense story of incredible bravery, one that isn’t diminished by knowing that the families successfully made it to the West.