Rex Gildo’s songs and musicals made him very popular. His best-known song was “Fiesta Mexicana” from 1972. Rosa von Praunheim tells the story of his life in the context of the gay pride movement, the normative pressures of the Schlager music industry, and the profound changes currently underway.
Each year in June, Bavarian housewife Elke Richter visits family in Halle, in the GDR. There she meets family friend Gregor Pohl, a married carpenter, and they begin having an affair. After her family stops the annual visits due to the husband's promotion in the communist regime, the adulterous couple arranges to meet on other holidays. After Gorbachev's Glasnost leads to the fall of the Iron Curtain, everything changes, and Gregor chooses to emigrate to Canada.