Berlin 1931/32. Lissy, young and pretty, sells cigarettes in a shop called "Quick". She would like to escape from this rather poor environment and sees a chance in her relation with the employee Alfred. But due to the economic crisis he loses his job. Furious, desperate but also calculating he becomes a member of the national socialist party NSDAP and soon also a member of the SA. Paul, Lissy's brother, for some time close to the communists, now also wears the SA uniform. But as suspicion is cast on him because of his hostile attitude towards capitalists, he is being shot by his own party fellow members. Lissy draws her conclusions and leaves her husband. She begins a new life, which comes closer to "her truth".

Berlin 1931/32: pretty young Lissy Schröder works in the "Quick" department store selling cigarettes with names like Nil, Senoussi, Juno and Saba or simply "four for a penny" to her customers. Her boss tries to take advantage of her when he finds out that she is pregnant although unmarried, but she boxes his ears and is fired. Lissy's boyfriend Freddi, a minor clerk, tries to organize an abortion, but in vain. Lissy marries Freddi Fromeyer. She gives birth to her child and occasionally visits her parents in the "red" district of Wedding. Her father is a war veteran and embittered social democratic trades union man who despises Fromeyer as a "snot". Lissy's mother concentrates all her efforts on easing her father's wrath. Her brother Paul, who used to be an active member of the communist youth movement and has been out of work for a long time, has moved away from home; he takes whatever he needs, regardless of the bounds of legality. Lissy's only friends, the communist activists Max and his wife, also live in Wedding. Freddi is fired by his Jewish boss, tries to drown his sorrows in alcohol and then tries his hand unsuccessfully as a travelling salesman. He is finally picked up by the rising Nazi star Kaszmerczyk and sent to the SA. His job is now to ensure the safety of NSDAP gatherings, as well as provocation and acts of violence against communists. Freddi does not like to join in, but conceals his doubts behind political platitudes. His affluence grows and he is promoted to the rank of "Sturmbannführer". Lissy acquires a maid and a piano but sadly notes the growing distance kept by her parents and friends. Even Paul joins the NSDAP, but refuses to take part in activities against communists. He is shot from behind by members of the SA. They raid Lissy's parents and abduct Max after having beaten him half to death; his wife dies of a heart attack. When Lissy finds out the truth of Paul's death, she does what she has to do.

Of all the directors working in the GDR, Konrad Wolf (1925-1982) was no doubt the one who studied Germany's history most intensively. The unusual biographical circumstances of Wolf's early life made the fight against fascism a central motif of his early films, for the son of dramatist Friedrich Wolf spent his childhood and youth in two countries: first in pre-fascist Germany and then, after 1933, in the Soviet Union under Stalin's dictatorship. As a director, Wolf was interested in people and their reactions when faced with a difficult decision to make, people whose life hung in the air and who did not really know what was going on, but who nevertheless try to find a way out. The script for LISSY was written by Konrad Wolf and Alexander Wedding on the basis of F.C. Weiskopf's novel "Die Versuchung" (The temptation). Unlike the novel, however, Wedding/Wolf did not make the resistance against fascism the central theme of their film, but focused instead on the bourgeois environment in which the Nazi ideology rapidly bore fruit against a background of impending destitution.

LISSY opens with poetic views of the metropolis of Berlin: courtyards and roofs, crossroads, people scurrying back and forth, soft wordless scenes as though seen through a veil. The distant sounds of a fairground emphasize the short-lived nature of these impressions. A feminine narrator dreamily tells of the people seen by the camera and how they buy oblivion with cigarettes whose names are enough to arouse desires, while the camera gradually closes in on Lissy's workplace at the "Quick" department store. This poetic density is subsequently only reached at a few points, such as when Lissy hears of Mrs. Franke's death and we see a global shot of a street in Wedding, deserted except for two horses pulling a funeral carriage. Or later, when Lissy leaves the chapel after her brother's funeral and walks down the cemetery's seemingly endless avenue of poplars before disappearing in the distance.

The two central heroes stand out distinctively (unlike the more stereotype subsidiary characters). Freddi Fromeyer (Horst Drinda) is an apolitical weakling while Lissy is a nice "average" girl played by Sonja Sutter with great lightness and sensitivity - "Lissy liked to kiss, she liked men and she loved to love." The heroine does not say much, for Wolf lets her express herself through gestures and her eyes in particular evocatively express her surprise, confusion, pain, shock and brief happiness. LISSY was Wolf's artistic breakthrough, both in the socialist countries and in the West.

Production Period

1956/1957

Production Year

1957

color

b/w

Aspect Ratio

1:1,33

Duration

Feature-Length Film (61+ Min.)

Type

Feature Film

Genre

Drama

Topic

Love, Relationship / Family, Social Engagement, Weimar Republic, Film History, National Socialism, Equal Rights / Emancipation

Available Media

Blu-ray Disc, Digital Film

Original Version

German (de)

Blu-ray Disc

Subtitles

German (full), English (en), French (fr), Spanish (Latin America), Portuguese (Brazil), Indonesisch (id)

Digital Film

Subtitles

German (full), English (en), French (fr), Spanish (Latin America), Portuguese (Brazil), Indonesisch (id)