쇠네만 감독은 1984년 더 이상 동독에서 원하는 영화를 만들 수 없다는 판단아래 남편과 함께 서독으로 이주신청을 한 후 국가안전교란죄로 동독 국가안전부에 체포되어 12개월 형을 받는다. 감독은 자신을 가두었던 교도소를 방문하여 교도관을 만나고 첫 2달을 같은 감옥에서 지냈던 여성과 자신에게 형을 내린 판사, DEFA 스튜디오의 디렉터와 자신의 석방을 주선하였던 변호사를 만나 자신을 기억하냐고 묻는다.
Ironies abound in this extremely sad melodrama about Elif (Zuhal Olcay), a Turkish immigrant in Germany who has been sent to prison for murdering her abusive husband. At the time of her imprisonment, she has never ventured outside the Turkish community, and even there has had no friends because of the demands her husband placed on her. She speaks no German. Now, in a place which most people find to be hell on earth, she gains a never-before known taste of freedom among these strangers, who don't even speak her own language. Unfortunately, as a "guest worker," she is horrified to discover that she is soon to be transferred to the horrific prisons of Turkey and will stand trial there for her crime, which will be much less understandingly dealt with in her home country than it would have been in Germany. The false paradise she must say goodbye to is her German prison.
Sibylle Schönemann’s film about abortion lets young and older women speak; women who were forced to abort by their partners or who chose to carry the baby to term despite predicted difficulties. Assembled as a kind of collage, a round table alternates with stylised passages, while the camera also shows moments in a clinic right before and after the procedure. The attitude vacillates between drama and affirmation of life. Liberal perspectives, with one exception, are left out. Schönemann, together with Tamara Trampe, almost managed to take up the complex issue in a feature film.
