To accompany the “Between the Images – A Photographic History of the Berlinale”, this month’s edition of Filmspotting is dedicated to two prize-winning films shown in the early years of the festival. DIE RATTEN (Robert Siodmak, West Germany 1955), an adaptation of Gerhard Hauptmann’s play of the same name, became the first ever German film to win the “Golden Bear” in 1955. Siodmak, who had only recently returned to Europe from exile in the US, transposed Hauptmann’s social drama into the present: the penniless Pauline, a refugee from Poland, leaves her new-born child to laundry owner Anna John out of pure despair and desperation. DIE RATTEN will be shown in the digitally restored version, just like the otherwise largely forgotten short film IN JEDEM LAND UND ZU DEINER ZEIT (Brigitte Reiner, West Germany 1952), which won in 1952. (ah) (29.10.)
