Sabine Michel

Their names are René, Sabine and Daniel – three people among thousands of others who go on to the streets of Dresden every Monday as “Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West”. They shout “We are the people!” They claim “Merkel must go!” The director Sabine Michel accompanied them for one year – on their demonstrations and in their daily lives. Merkel Must Go is not a film about PEGIDA, it asks for the personal reasons for this patriotic protest, a film about realistic and absurd fears of the present.

Their names are René, Sabine and Daniel – three people among thousands of others who go on to the streets of Dresden every Monday as “Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West”. They shout “We are the people!” They claim “Merkel must go!” The director Sabine Michel accompanied them for one year – on their demonstrations and in their daily lives. Merkel Must Go is not a film about PEGIDA, it asks for the personal reasons for this patriotic protest, a film about realistic and absurd fears of the present.

In her documentary, director Sabine Michel revisits her own experiences during the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and Germany's subsequent reunification, as well as those of her four friends Claudi, Vera, Claudia and Veruscha. The five women were about 18 years old at that time, and belonged to the last school class in Dresden to graduate in the German Democratic Republic. The country and society school had prepared them for suddenly ceased to exist, thus they had to completely start anew. More than twenty years later, the five women travel to Paris together. During the train ride, they talk about their former dreams and aspirations, and how different their lives turned out to be.

In her documentary, director Sabine Michel revisits her own experiences during the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and Germany's subsequent reunification, as well as those of her four friends Claudi, Vera, Claudia and Veruscha. The five women were about 18 years old at that time, and belonged to the last school class in Dresden to graduate in the German Democratic Republic. The country and society school had prepared them for suddenly ceased to exist, thus they had to completely start anew. More than twenty years later, the five women travel to Paris together. During the train ride, they talk about their former dreams and aspirations, and how different their lives turned out to be.

It’s country versus city in this darkly comic showdown between the wily inhabitants of a farm and its arrogant new owner.