Bertolt Brecht

The Change of the Wheel (2024)

A flat tire shocks a passenger. Stopped at the roadside, she thinks about her life while the driver changes the tire, unsure if this is the right path. ...

The Seven Deadly Sins / Mahagonny Song Play - Teatro Alla Scala (2021)

The Seven Deadly Sins tells the story of two sisters, Anna I and Anna II. The sisters set out from the banks of the Mississippi River in Louisiana to find their fortune in the big cities, intending to send their family enough money to build a little house ...

The Good Man from Szechuan (2020)

In the search for a single good person in the province of Sezuan, three gods finally find only poor street girl Shen Te, whom they reward with a large gift of money. Now wealthy, Shen Te is now so exploited by all men that she has no choice but to slip int ...

Rules of the Assembly Line, at High Speed (2020)

A small town in Western Germany is the last stop for 26,000 pigs per day and a brief home for masses of Eastern European temporary workers. The workers of the largest slaughterhouse in the country are fighting for survival, while German activists who stand ...

Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny (2019)

Composed in the 1930s by Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht, this is a mordant satire on capitalism and the inexorable industrialization of a society in which the ultimate crime is not having money ...

Trommeln in der Nacht (2018)

National Theatre Live: The Threepenny Opera (2016)

As London's East End scrubs up for the coronation, Mr and Mrs Peachum gear up for a bumper day in the beggary business. Keeping tight control of the city's underground – and their daughter's whereabouts. ...

Marianne (2013)

On the verge of professional breakthrough, a young Bertolt Brecht reflects on relationships. ...

Alter Bahnhof Video Walk (2012)

The Alter Bahnhof Video Walk was designed for the old train station in Kassel, Germany as part of dOCUMENTA (13). Participants are able to borrow an iPod and headphones from a check-out booth. They are then directed by Cardiff and Miller through the statio ...

The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny (2011)

A hard-hitting new production of Kurt Weill's Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny by the Catalan collective La Fura dels Baus at the Teatro Real de Madrid. Composed in the 1930s by Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht, this is a mordant satire on capitalism a ...

Corneille-Brecht ou Rome l'unique objet de mon ressentiment (2009)

Co-director Cornelia Geiser sits by a window on an easy chair reading aloud a few verses by Corneille, then a somewhat longer excerpt from Brecht - each writer referencing Rome but really condemning injustice in his own era. ...

Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny (2007)

- Recorded live at Los Angeles Opera, 1 & 4 March 2007. Welcome to Mahagonny, where sin is "in" and love is always on sale. This Old West boomtown rises from the desert to become a razzle-dazzle mecca for lust, liberty, and the pursuit of pleasure. Cash i ...

Canção de Baal (2007)

A marginal version of Brecht's piece, "Baal". ...

Baal (2004)

Baal, a young artist whom society regards as a genius, does not want to be monopolized by the culture and business. ...

Le cercle de craie caucasien (2002)

The Threepenny Opera (2000)

Macheath (Mack the Knife), notorious bandit and womanizer, runs afoul of Jonathan Peachum when he marries Peachum's daughter Polly in a ceremony of doubtful legality. Peachum's resolve to have Mack sent to the gallows is complicated by the fact that Mack's ...

The Seduction of Angels (2000)

A young man cruises through the nightly city. He meets people, silhouettes, strange and scary. They all end up in a dim night club. ...

The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny (1998)

Depicts the consumerism of the mythical city of Mahagonny, conveying all its ripe decadence. A Hollywood Babylon full of pyramidal towers, carved elephants, commodified sex and licensed gluttony. An opera in three acts, live from the Salzburger Festspiele ...

The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui (1997)

A television staging of the 1941 Brecht play, The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui. ...

The Career of Arturo Ui (1996)

When the powerful of this world give a small scoundrel the opportunity to become a big scoundrel - how many opportunities there are for a funny comedy... ...

The Threepenny Opera (1995)

The Threepenny Opera proclaims itself "an opera for beggars," and it was in fact an attempt both to satirize traditional opera and operetta and to create a new kind of musical theater based on the theories of two young German artists, composer Kurt Weill a ...

The Seven Deadly Sins (1993)

Anna I and Anna II set out on a seven year journey that takes them through a series of varied life experiences while their parents and two brothers remain behind. ...

Antigone (1992)

A fearless Antigone, refusing to allow the dishonored body of her murdered brother Polynices to be devoured by vultures and dogs, defies the Thebian tyrant Creon by burying him. ...

La vie de Galilée (1992)

Mise-en-scène, at the Comédie-Française, of La Vie de Galilée by Bertolt Brecht. This is the last staging by Antoine Vitez. ...

Mack the Knife (1989)

In 19th century London, a young girl falls for a womanizing criminal and they decide to wed. Her family strongly disapproves so her father, 'the king of thieves', gets the gangster arrested. ...

Der Mantel des Ketzers (1989)

Based on a novella by Bertolt Brecht. ...

Мещанская свадьба (1989)

Die Bestie (1988)

Moscow in the 1920s. A film about the pogroms in southern Russia is being made in a studio. The name of the notorious tsarist governor Muratov, also known as "The Beast", symbolizes the crimes of the time. During filming, an old, decrepit man comes forward ...

Anna Firling's Roads (1985)

A tory based on classical theatre play "Mother Courage and Her Children" by Bertolt Brecht. ...

The Caucasian Chalk Circle (1985)

The hardships faced by a woman trying to survive a bloody civil war while caring for the abandoned child of the deposed former ruler. ...

Sade Vatandaş Şvayk Hitler'e Karşı (1984)

During World War II, Şvayk, a seemingly ordinary, hapless dog-seller, finds himself entangled with the Nazi regime. ...

Baal (1982)

Baal is an amoral poetic genius who, after a life of debauchery, betrayal and violence, is about to cut his ties to the world and meet his doom. A high society party is where the end begins. ...

Svatba (1981)

Germany Pale Mother (1980)

Germany 1939. Hans and Lene marry the day before the war breaks out, and Hans is sent to the Eastern front. During a bombing raid their daughter Anna is born. The house is destroyed and Lene and Anna moves in with relatives in Berlin. Hans survives the war ...

No. 18: Mahagonny (1980)

Harry Smith's final film; an epic four-screen projection. Smith worked on this cinematic transformation of Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht's opera Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny (1929) for over ten years and considered it his magnum opus. The film wa ...

The Tailor of Ulm (1980)

Dammbeck made this film – a reference to the myth of Icarus and a metaphor for failure, hope, and human exploration – at the invitation of the legendary animator Kurt Weiler. It's the first example of Dammbeck's experimental, grotesque, surrealistic st ...

Die Rache des Kapitäns Mitchell (1979)

The "Astoria", an English luxury liner, collides with a freighter shortly before the end of its voyage and threatens to sink. Captain Mitchell, successful and envied, sets in motion an expensive rescue operation. He manages to avert a catastrophe and bring ...

Herr Puntila And His Servant Matti (1979)

Based on the Bertolt Brecht play, the movie follows the farmer Puntila, who when he's sober is a real pig but whenever he gets drunk becomes very generous. Puntila is trying to get his daughter to get married, but the problem is that his drunk self wants h ...

Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny (1979)

John Dexter's brilliant production, James Levine's masterful conducting of the eclectic score, and a sensational cast come together to make this Kurt Weill–Bertolt Brecht masterpiece a riveting evening of music theater. At the center of the action is Jim ...

Brecht and Co (1979)

Brecht's company of actors tells the story of Bertolt Brecht: his theatre, plays, poetry and his life. ...

Låt er inte förföras (1978)

"Don't Be Seduced" - Gothenburg's Brecht-ensemble performs songs and texts of Bertolt Brecht, Kurt Weill and Hanns Eisler. ...

Das Leben des Galileo Galilei (1978)

Der Hofmeister (1976)

Death of the Flea Circus Director (1975)

With the help of his assistant Anja, Ottocaro Weiss intends to put the plague on stage: circumstances beyond his control and a lack of fresh talent have forced him to close down his flea circus. For Weiss, the plague means the «extinction of everything th ...

Die Gewehre der Frau Carrar (1975)

Galileo (1975)

Challenged by a new student, tutor and theorist Galileo co-opts emerging telescope technology and discovers irrefutable proof of the heretical notion that the earth is not the center of the universe. But in a rigid society ruled by an uneasy alliance of ar ...

I Was, I Am, I Will Be (1974)

In the spring of 1974, a camera team from Studio H&S succeeded against the explicit orders of the Junta's Chancellery, entered into two large concentration camps in the north of the country - Chacabuco and Pisagua - leaving with filmed sequences and sound ...

Mahagonny (1974)

The city of Mahagonny, founded by three criminals, becomes a place for people looking for their luck or money. One among them is the lumberjack Jim Mahoney. However, he is disappointed by what the city is. ...

Der aufhaltsame Aufstieg des Arturo Ui (1974)

Hitler's seizure of power in 1933 and his rule in the years that followed are transferred to the North American criminal world of the 1930s in a parable. Gangster boss Ui needs the protection of the ruling class to achieve his goals and offers his help to ...

Dificuldade de Governar (1974)

Animation of Bertolt Brecht's namesake poem recited by Mario Viegas ...

The Good Person of Szechwan (1973)

When the gods appear in disguise the only person who shows them hospitality is the young girl Shen Te and for this she is awarded by them. After a while she finds her new life has also brought new problems. ...

The Gangster Show: The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui (1972)

The rise to underworld eminence of the notorious Chicago gangster Artuto Ui - who bears a striking resemblance to Adolf Hitler. ...

History Lessons (1972)

Set in contemporary Rome, the film shows through a series of encounters with "ancient" Romans, how the economic and political manipulation by ancient Roman society led to Caesar's dictatorship. ...

Trummor i natten (1972)

After the first world war Andreas returns to Berlin to find it in chaos after the fall of the empire. The main battle is between the Spartacists and the Freikorps and Andreas needs to find a place for himself in the conflict for the future of Germany. ...

Bubny a trumpety (1970)

Baal (1970)

An exploration of the cult of the genius, an anti-heroic figure who chooses to be a social outcast and live on the fringe of bourgeois morality. ...

Schweik in World War II (1969)

Based on the satirical anti-war comedy of the same name by B. Brecht. ...

Im Dickicht der Städte (1968)

An inexplicable showdown between two men and the downfall of a family that has moved from the prairies to the jungle of the big city. ...

Regeln och undantaget (1968)

A television drama about a trial against a merchant who killed one of his employees. ...

Der gute Mensch von Sezuan (1966)

The Shameless Old Lady (1965)

Madame Bertini, a newly widowed 70-year-old miser, has lived a sheltered life in squalour. She determines to venture into the modern world and have as much fun as possible, and in doing so finds that she loves it. She blows her life savings, much to the di ...

The Life of Galileo (1964)

BBC version of Brecht's epic account of Galileo's persecution for his 'heretical' idea that the earth moved around the sun. ...

Pušky paní Carrarové (1963)

The Threepenny Opera (1963)

The Gangster Macheath secretly marries the daughter of beggar king Peachum. When Peachum finds out, he instructs the police chief Brown to arrest and hang Macheath. If not, all the beggars of Soho will disturb the upcoming coronation. ...

Kavkazský křídový kruh (1962)

Leben des Galilei (1962)

Mother Courage and Her Children (1961)

During the Thirty Years' War, the camp-follower Anna Fierling, called "Mother Courage", travels the length and breadth of Europe with her covered wagon. She does not care if it's Catholics or Protestants she trades with as long as business thrives. She los ...

Księżyc z Alabamy (1961)

Herr Puntila and His Servant Matti (1960)

This first film adaptation of Bertolt Brecht's play about class distinctions was made in 1955 in the Vienna Rosenhügel studios, but it was only premiered five years later. Curt Bois plays the rich capitalist Puntila who only becomes somewhat agreeable whe ...

Zadržitelný vzestup Artura Uie (1960)

Der kaukasische Kreidekreis (1958)

Mutter Courage und ihre Kinder (1957)

Set during the Thirty Years' War between 1624 and 1636, film tells the story of the sutler Anna Fierling, known as Mother Courage, who tries to make her fortune from the war and loses her three children in the process. ...

Song of the Rivers (1954)

An allegorical documentary about the workers of the world, whose common destinies and hopes for peace are symbolically united by the rivers that run through their respective lands. The film was shot on the Volga, the Mississippi, the Nile, the Yangtze, the ...

Wilhelm Pieck - Das Leben unseres Präsidenten (1952)

Basing his work on documentary material, Andrew Thorndike tells the life story of Wilhelm Pieck: from young worker to fighter for the German working class, and from enemy of national-socialism to the first president of the German Democratic Republic. ...

Leben des Galilei (1947)

Galileo, an eminent professor and scientist in the 17th century Venetian Republic, is short of money. A prospective student tells him about a novel invention, the telescope, that is being sold in Amsterdam. ...

Hangmen Also Die! (1943)

During the Nazi occupation of Czechoslovakia, surgeon Dr. Franticek Svoboda, a Czech patriot, assassinates the brutal "Hangman of Europe", Reichsprotektor Reinhard Heydrich, and is wounded in the process. In his attempt to escape, he is helped by history p ...

The Murderers Are Coming (1942)

Brecht's play Fear and Misery of the Third Reich consists of a series of playlets, portraying National Socialist Germany of the 1930s as a land of poverty, violence, fear and pretence. Nazi antisemitism is depicted in several of the sketches, including "th ...

Schweik is Preparing For Battle (1942)

Kuhle Wampe or Who Owns the World? (1932)

Kuhle Wampe takes place in early-1930s Berlin. The film begins with a montage of newspaper headlines describing steadily-rising unemployment figures. This is followed by scenes of a young man looking for work in the city and the family discussing the unpai ...

A Man's a Man (1931)

About a civilian who is press-ganged into a machine-gunner's squadron and transformed into the perfect soldier. ...

The Threepenny Opera (1931)

The French-language version of the The Threepenny Opera with a different cast from the German version. ...

The 3 Penny Opera (1931)

In London at the turn of the century, underworld kingpin Mack the Knife marries Polly Peachum without the knowledge of her father, the equally enterprising 'king of the beggars'. ...

Brecht und das Berliner Ensemble (2019)

Documentary about Brecht and the Berliner Ensemble. ...

Theater of War (2008)

A behind-the-scenes look at The Public Theater's production of Bertolt Brecht's "Mother Courage" that examines the playwright's life and ideas. ...

Brecht vs. Pabst: The Transformation of The Threepenny Opera (2007)

The documentary traces the tragic story of the "Threepenny Opera" from stage to screen and ultimately to the bitter lawsuit between Bertolt Brecht and the film producers. ...

Brecht - Die Kunst zu leben (2006)

He wanted to revolutionize theater practice and at the same time social awareness: Today Brecht, who was born in Augsburg in 1898 and died in East Berlin in 1956, is one of the most important playwrights of the 20th century. ...

Carola Neher - Todesursache unbekannt (1990)

"Cause of Death Unknown" - Carola Neher (1900-1942) actress, singer and feminist. Brecht wrote the role Polly Peachum for her. She practiced boxing with Marlene Dietrich. After Hitler seized power, thousands of German communists and anti-fascists fled to t ...

Der springende Punkt (1987)

Archive footage of bomb detonations during the Second World War combined with abstract graphic elements which show the destructive potential of modern nuclear missiles. Together the images are a silent warning of armament and war. ...