Film Screening
The Airship

Wed, 05/17/2023
6:30 PM Goethe-Institut Boston

RSVP Intro and Q&A: Mariana Ivanova (in person)


Stannebein is "an inventor of air ships for the benefit of mankind," or so he sees himself and his place in world history. In order to secure financing for his fancy, he adapts to the rhetoric of the time and, unwittingly, ends up building an air base for the Nazi German Legion Condor in Spain. His protest to the Nazi authorities is, of course, in vain. In 1945, his family starts to inquire about him, surmising that his past and his patents might be valuable. However, Stannebein's last residence, the insane asylum, stands empty... 
Director Rainer Simon brought together an exceptional team to create DEFA’s most unconventional film, including Lutz Dammbeck (animation) and Friedrich Goldmann (score).

Director: Rainer Simon
East-Germany 1982
116 min.
German with English subtitles

Mariana Ivanova is Associate Professor for German Film and Media and the Academic Director of the DEFA Film Library at UMass Amherst. Her scholarship focuses on twentieth and twenty-first century German and European cinemas and cultures, theories of transnational filmmaking and coproduction, artistic networks and cultural mediation. Ivanova’s 2019 monograph, Cinema of Collaboration: DEFA Coproductions and International Exchange in Cold War Europe, was finalist for the international Willy Hass award. She has published her research in several edited volumes about Central European cinema.