Elfriede Kuzmany

An adaptation of Ottfried Preussler's popular children's book.

For fans of history, this glimpse of Munich society in the 1920s will be a much-treasured event. The story revolves around an art-gallery manager who puts on a show featuring the scandalous works of a woman artist who committed suicide. He is unjustly accused of having committed adultery with her, and for some reason the authorities decide to make an example of him. He is imprisoned at about the same time that Hitler and the nascent Nazi party attempt the infamous Beer Hall Putsch, and the gallery manager's girlfriend and a Swiss writer valiantly (and unsuccessfully) attempt to get better justice for him. Nobody in authority, it seems, has the courage to take up the challenge of righting this particular injustice.

The adaptation of a lesser known novel by Nobelist Ivo Andric, which describes the life of a spinster who was overwhelmed by a single passion: avarice.

France 1944: American pilot Philip Sturgess is shot down but found by a resistance group. In the neighborhood Sturgess meets another American and shortly thereafter the British Major Barton, called “Reiher”. He claims to have fled a German prison camp. Shortly before leaving for Spain to escape the Nazis, Sturgess discovers that Barton has written a letter to Germany. This confirms the suspicion that he could be a German spy…

The Falling Star (German: Der Fallende Stern) is a 1950 West German drama film directed by Harald Braun. It was entered into the 1951 Cannes Film Festival.