One of my favourite TV productions, no Hollywood glamour, plain rural life
in the Hunsrück.
HEIMAT
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0087400/
Film 1
Aching for distant lands (1919-1928):
Paul has arrived in Schabbach. He has walked back to the Hunsrück from captivity in France.
His family and the village residents that have observed his return are crowded in the Simon´s small kitchen, and want to know everything that has happened to him. But Paul is too tired. He falls asleep. Even young Maria did not overlook the return of Paul Simon.
Paul brought a fascination for radio home from the war, and developed into an amateur radio builder. The rich farmer Wiegand, who has bought himself a motorbike, would like to own a radio and commissions Paul to build him one.
In the small village of Schabbach, a war memorial is unveiled. Paul falls in love with Appolonia, the innkeepers maid, who is called a gypsy by the townspeople because of her black hair. Appolonia leaves the village and goes to Koblenz. There, she becomes pregnant by a French soldier, with whom she moves to France.
Paul and Maria get closer
An American pilot lands in the field by the village. Paul´s brother Eduard is to procure fuel for him, in return for which Paul is allowed to board the biplane for a flight over Schabbach.
Paul and Maria, the daughter of the large-scale farmer Wiegand, get married. Shortly thereafter, Maria has her first son, Anton. Her second son, Ernst, comes into the world a year later.
Paul´s sister Pauline marries the watchmaker Robert in Simmern. Eduard gets a severe lung inflammation when, together with the bell ringer and Glasisch, he searches for gold in the cold waters of Goldbach.
In the forest, the body of a naked young woman is found.
One day, Paul says he is going out for a beer, but he´s not to be found at the local tavern. Maria searches the entire district, but Paul has disappeared without a trace.
Film 2
The Center of the World (1929-1933):
In the village it is still not clear whether Paul Simon is still alive. In Schabbach in the Hunsrück, one has no way of knowing that he has arrived in America.
A French woman on horseback is searching for Chateau Baldeau. She´s on her way to Berlin and wants to spend the night there. The villagers try, with their limited French, to explain that Baldenau is just a ruin and offer her a room at the Inn.
Eduard is in Berlin to get treatment for his lung disease from Professor Sauerbruch. During an evening walk in the capital of the Reich he meets a group of scantily clad women who entice him into a house.
Eduard finds himself in a brothel where he comes together with the madam, Lucie, whom he tells about his family in the Hunsrück. Lucie mistakenly assumes that the family owns a large estate
They get married shortly thereafter. When he returns with her to the Hunsrück, he introduces the bewildered (and obviously disappointed) Lucie to his family.
When it becomes clear that Eduard is not the son of a big land owner, Lucie pushes him to join the party. Wiegand sends his son Wilfried to Berlin to join the SS.
Paul´s mother Katharina visits her relatives in the Ruhr. She witnesses the arrest of her nephew Fritz, who is taken to a Concentration camp because of his contacts with the German Communist Party.
Film 3
A Christmas like never before (1935):
Even the small Hunsrück community of Schabbach gets telephone service.
Lucie established contact with the Gauleiter, also named Simon, and used the connection to make sure Eduard became the mayor of Rhaunen. With a loan from the Jewish Bank in Mainz, Eduard and Lucie build themselves a villa.
The family attends a Christmas mass and is enthusiastic about the new age.Only Katharina has misgivings
Wilfried Wiegand is back from Berlin and has become an SS officer. He brings Lucie news that high officials plan to visit the villa. Three members of the Nazi elite are on a trip through the Hunsrück and are going to make a rest stop in the village.
Lucie is fired with enthusiasm. Is this the opportunity to take her Eduard to the very top?
Film 4
Highway (1938):
Maria and Pauline go to the cinema and watch a Zarah Leander movie. At home, they wait for Robert, whos in Idar-Oberstein to buy jewelry. Pauline tells Maria about the new customers. She shows Maria the deaths head ring that is so popular with the workers building the Hunsrück highway.
Even Otto Wohlleben has such a ring. He´s a structural engineer and lives at the Simon house in Schabbach. In the evening he helps young Ernst build model planes. When Wohlleben comes home with a broken arm, Maria must care for him. They go dancing together and fall in love.
Martina, a former Colleague of Lucie´s from Berlin, is on a visit to the villa. Lucie is not too happy about it. Will it come out how Eduard´s wife used to make her money?
Film 5
Away and back again (1938-1939):
A letter from America! Maria had just forgotten Paul and was happy in her relationship with Otto when the man everyone thought was dead sent word from the states. On the letterhead is a picture of a factory. Simon Electric Company, Detroit, USA, Postbox. So Paul has made something of himself in America. He writes that he would like to visit the family, and would soon be traveling to Germany. Maria is horrified. She doesnt know which way to turn. What was to become of her new love?
Otto is transferred to Trier. Maria and Anton go to Hamburg, where Pauls ship is to arrive. Paul is denied entry, however, because he doesn´t have proof of Aryan descent.
Maria sends a telegram to Eduard in Rhaunen to ask him for help. Together with Wilfried, Eduard searches through archives of church record books to investigate the lineage of the Simon family. But they aren´t able to procure the appropriate document in time, so Paul has to return with the ship to America.
On the radio, Hitler announces the attack on Poland. Itis war.
Film 6
The Home Front (1943):
The war has even come to the Hunsrück. On the edge of Schabbach lies the wreckage of an English airplane that´s been shot down. A couple of children tell Wilfried Wiegand of an Englishman who has parachuted from his plane and lies wounded in the woods. They lead the SS man up to a clearing. The pilot lies on the ground, helpless and moaning from the pain. Without batting an eye, Wiegand shoots him to death. He later said that he had to shoot the Englishman because he was trying to escape.
Otto Wohlleben has been removed from the Organization Todt and attached to a bomb disposal unit. Because he has Jewish ancestors, the Nazis can do without his engineering skills. He still doesn´t know that Maria has borne his son.
Martha has come from Hamburg to the Simon´s house. She is the fiancée of Maria´s son Anton and is in the advanced stages of pregnancy. In old Wiegand´s parlour.
Martha and Anton, who is on the Eastern front, are married by telephone. Ernst flies over Schabbach in a training plane and throws flowers to the bride.
Film 7
The Love of Soldiers (1944):
Anton has been transferred to a Propoganda Company and is present during the filming of people being shot to death in the woods.
Otto comes to Schabbach and falls into Maria´s arms when he finds out that Hermann is his son. The next day, he must set off to defuse a bomb. During the defusing of this bomb, something goes wrong. Otto Wohlleben is blown to pieces. The anti-aircraft battery in Schabbach is destroyed by airplanes. There are dead and wounded. Shortly thereafter, Americans enter the village. Lucie takes trouble to collect her valuables, because as a party member she must certainly leave her villa. Wilfried is a broken man and kneels in the music room in a daze. Eduard sees two black soldiers through the window as he notices the picture of Hitler on the wall.
Film 8
The American (1945-1947):
Martina has found Pollack in Berlin, dying. She tries to distract him from the battle raging outside by playing the piano. Eventually, the doctor would arrive, after the fighting had quieted down...
The Americans have marched into the Hunsrück. But not it´s not just soldiers from the USA that have set foot in the place. A large man with a hat and a black chauffeur is also seen in Schabbach.
When he hits the anvil with the hammer in the smithy and Katharina runs home from the cemetery, she says with certainty: You´re Paul!
The entire village is happy that the American has returned and is putting on a festival where everyone can eat their fill. Only Maria is not happy
Yet another visitor comes into the Simon house. Klärchen claims to be the fiancée of Ernst, who has not come home yet. He is presently avoiding the village because he intends to become rich trading on the black market.
Meanwhile, Maria´s oldest son flees from captivity in Russia and marches back to the Hunsrück by way of Turkey, Greece, and the alps. During his journey, he worked out patents in his head, which he tells his young wife about in the meadow by the village.
Katharina goes to bed because she wants to rest. When someone checks on her shortly thereafter, she is dead.
Film 9
Hermännchen (1955-1956):
Hermann and school friends from the Gymnasium in Simmern are traveling by bicycle along the Rhein. He wants to visit his Uncle Ernst, who is transporting tree trunks with his new helicopter. In the evening, they visit a Parish Fair, where Hermann meets Schnüsschen
Anton has also become an entrepreneur, and has erected the Optical Works Simon OHG on the meadow by the village. He allows the villagers to take part in his success. Many are employed in Antons firm. After a festival organized by the Simon company, Klärchen, Lotti, and Hermann lie in a bed. What they show him there has more consequences for Hermann and Klärchen than just adventure. They fall in love with each other.
Kind regards,
Beate
HEIMAT
Moderator: Pirkka
Re: HEIMAT
An outstanding German production on a par with Das Boot.