Classic DEFA Dramas

Included in the classic DEFA repertoire are numerous award-winning productions, the names of the important German directors of the previous century and the most popular film stars of their times. After the war, Wolfgang Staudte, Konrad Wolf and Frank Beyer dealt with the horrors of the Second World War that could still be felt. They made films like The Murderers Are Among Us with Hildegard Knef and Rotation with Paul Esser, Professor Mamlock with Hilmar Thate and Naked Among Wolves with Armin Mueller-Stahl. Over the decades the topics shifted: life in the GDR, the search of a little personal happiness, the own identity or the big love came to the fore. Timeless masterpieces like Berlin – Schoenhauser Corner, Her Third, Solo Sunny or The Legend Of Paul And Paula were thus created.

The Progress Crime Corner

Where there is criminal energy, there is an imperative: "One Has To Be The Corpse!" Many DEFA thrillers broach the issue of the East-West conflict e.g. Place Of Crime: Berlin, Rendezvous Aimée or For Eyes Only. There are links to historical criminal cases; atmospheric impressions add to the picture of the spirit of the times.

Literature and Art

Goethe and Schiller, Beethoven and Goya – either their biographies or their artistic works are represented in the repertoire of PROGRESS’ feature films. The famous DEFA directors liked to address art and artists: like Konrad Wolf with Goya, Egon Günther with Mask Of Desire and Lotte In Weimar – or Wolfgang Staudte with the film adaptation of Heinrich Mann’s novel The Kaiser’s Lackey.

Stingers From East Germany

In 1953, the cabaret “Die Distel” (The Thistle) was founded in Berlin; in the same year, DEFA started producing satiric short films with the name Stingers From East Germany. While the cabaret still exists, the hedgehog on a black background disappeared from cinema screens in 1964. Satire was a difficult field in the GDR – some things permitted on stage could not be transferred to film. Film satire was a balancing act between honest critique, patronization and the search for artistic expression. It was supposed to be constructive and optimistic within the GDR and serve anti-Western propaganda abroad. About 300 short films were produced with the logo “Stingers From East Germany” as supporting films.

Science Fiction

With the Soderbergh remake of Solaris in 2002, a very unusual genre came to international attention: Science Fiction from the East. Two of these rare films are based on novels by Stanislaw Lem – the first film adaptation of "Solaris" by Andrej Tarkowski and The Silent Star shot by Kurt Maetzig in 1959 based on the Lem novel “The Astronauts”. Gottfried Kolditz’ SciFi production Signals – An Adventure In Space was also based on a novel.

Western from the East

A very popular genre of PROGRESS is the Western, predominantly staring Gojko Mitic, the senior Indian on German soil. Whether Apache, Cheyenne or Mohican, the DEFA Westerns excel in their historical correctness and refrain from patriotic pathos which brought them official praise from a chief in Canada. The big chiefs Severino, Chingachgook, Osceola, Ulzana and Tecumseh were immortalized on film. Apart from the tragic struggle for survival, there are also the Wild West parodies, such as Kit & Co. with Dean Reed, who was allowed to play a real American in Sing, Cowboy, Sing.