Westler (1985)

I love this movie so much

the audience applauded

Am i the only one who thinks........Average?

A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

First - the good things about the film. Nice blond Rainer Strecker's character seems a good representative of East Berlinean gay archetype in the 1980s :) Some of the GDR tokens - Nina Hagen, obligatory military service for men, the Baltic for a week off, Prague over weekend, signs in Russian every now and then - will definitely make some modern Germans nostalgic... That country is gone for good - or for bad :) Now the actual critique. The good, albeit trite, collision - love across the barb wire ("why can't we two simply live together") deteriorates as the film reels. Poor "pseudo-documentary" script. Strained story-telling. Awful MIDI-synthesizer soundtrack. Far from best use of 90 minutes' screen time. Obtrusive exploitation of how-bad-communism-is type of details. Was this meant to be a propaganda film? Recommend to watch something else. If you are looking for films on GDR - there are better ones, try e.g. "Nowhere to go" (Die Unberuehrbare)

I first saw this film on German TV and have since acquired a copy for use with 18plus students. The treatment of a difficult subject - both in respect of the political problems created by the cold war and the growing relationship between the two main characters is brilliant. It is impossible not to empathise with the boys - even if you are not convinced of same-sex relationships ( in which case apply the same problems to a boy-girl scenario). The ending leaves you to determine the outcome for yourself and the problems which the two boys have to endure would test any relationship to the full - please watch it with an open mind. The song 'West of the Wall' - a so-so hit for Miss Toni Fisher - is one of the film's highlights and 'camped-up' by The Waltons superbly. It's almost worth watching just for this performance. I defy anyone to watch the film through and have no opinion at the end. Forget its time and place - it could still be today, and with some of the pressures on young guys even now, this just might remove some prejudices still held.

I bought the VHS (thank God I didn't spend money on the more expensive DVD) of this movie, as it was being advertised as THE German gay classic. I was very disappointed. Although the idea of the story is great (young man from West- Berlin falls in love with young man from East- Berlin, the wall makes their romance complicated) and all the actors are trying as hard as they can, the movie lacks some serious story-telling capabilities on the director's side. A script is basically non-existent, the musical score is terrible and even "non-candid camera" shots in West- Berlin are terribly photographed. Thumbs up for candid camera shots of every-day life in 1985's East- Berlin and sneaking into a gay bar in communist Germany and for performances by the actors playing the couple. But NOT a must-see.

Two men live only a few kilometers apart, and yet it is almost as if they are from different worlds -- East Berlin and West Berlin. Their blossoming romance is doomed by the Wall that separates their worlds, so they must savor the few moments they can share.