Images from Heimat 3 - Part 6 - Farewell To Schabbach
Select thumbnail for full image gallery.
Heimat 3 - Part 6 - Farewell To Schabbach (12A)
- Consumer Advice: Contains one use of strong language
- Run time: 1 hour 54 mins
- Language: German
- Genre: Drama
- Release date: 1st January 2005
- Starring: Jorg Altmeyer, Jutta Altmeyer, Casper Arnhold
- Directed by: Edgar Reitz
- Distributor: Artificial Eye
Plot Synopsis
On the 9 August 1999, the day of the solar eclipse, Gunnar Brehme travels to Munich. The natural spectacle is not the reason for his visit, however, even though the masses of people wearing “eclipse glasses” are thronging into the city centre in anticipation. Gunnar has to begin a prison sentence for drunken driving thanks to a visit to the Oktoberfest the previous year. In the crowd he meets Tillmann and Moni who are visiting the city with a coach load of amateur dramatists from Schabbach. Hermann and Clarissa are also in Munich on that day to start their joint tour with an evening of Günderrode Songs.
Fascinated and without glasses, Gunnar looked at the sun for too long and this injured his eyes. His injury, however, gives him grounds for having his imprisonment deferred by a day and he is able to visit his ex-wife Petra and, above all, his two daughters who are now teenagers. He meets the family just as Petra and Reinhold are leaving to attend Hermann and Clarissa’s concert. Gunnar then spends the evening alone with his daughters and learns that Nadine, the eldest, has never forgotten him as her “real” father. She can still remember him playing the entertainer on the piano. Touched, Gunnar admits to her that he has to go into prison for six months.
While Petra and Reinhold are about to join the two artists at a restaurant after the concert, the Hunsrück coach crosses their path. Hermann learns that Rudi, the Schabbach innkeeper, has died. He and Clarissa are distressed that death has separated two people who seemed an emblem of eternal love. Coming after Clarissa’s illness, which now seems to be cured, Rudi’s death is a brutal reminder of the ever-present threat to life and love. Hermann sets off alone on the journey to the Hunsrück.
Gunnar has gone into prison with an ambitious plan. From prison he wants to organise a reunion to take place at the millennium on the spot which for him and, when he thinks about it, for all the others has been a turning-point in their lives – the Günderrode-House on the Rhine. Gunnar has been speculating on the stock market and can come up with the money for a memorable party. The only pre-requisite, however, is that the Bavarian judiciary will recognise his impeccable behaviour as a prisoner and release him in time for the millennium. Gunnar is confident they will.
In Schabbach the whole village is there to pay their last respects to the deceased Rudi. The priest reminds them of Rudi’s unquestionable love for his Lenchen. Distressed, Hermann walks through the cemetery, visiting the graves of his relatives. But there is no peace in the earth of his homeland. A sudden earthquake engulfs Ernst’s painting collection, his treasures hoarded in an old slate mine. The repentant community had now approved the museum project under Lulu’s direction. However, the building work has broken down supporting walls in the former galleries, an underground lake releases huge amounts of water out of the caves and floods the Goldbach property. Lulu is able to rescue her son Lukas and the nanny from the flood at the last minute. The next day Lulu, defying death and entering the galleries, is only able to confirm that Ernst’s Nibelungen hoard is gone forever. Her job has also been destroyed. Dejected, she returns to Cologne with her son.
From prison Gunnar has done a brilliant job of organising the party at Günderrode-House. Thanks to him, New Year’s Eve on the Rhine becomes a reunion for everyone. Only Gunnar himself can’t be there. The Bavarian judiciary shows no mercy and lets him spend the turn of the millennium in his cell. Lulu spent New Year with Roland, her old friend, leaving her little son with Hermann at the Günderrode-House. Roland has AIDS and is close to death. When Lulu returns on New Year’s morning she is met by Lukas’ soft piano playing. Away from the round of New Year’s parties the little boy, in his enthusiasm for music, has practised an entire Mozart sonatina. Lulu cries with emotion, but also from sadness and despair.