Käte Alving

The Last Witness (1960)

Director Wolfgang Staudte who left East Germany in 1953 to make movies in West Germany, takes a few swipes at the West German judicial system in this fairly effective courtroom drama about the murder of a four-month-old baby. Police almost immediately arre ...

Der wahre Jakob (1960)

Forbidden Paradise (1958)

Combining documentary elements with a playful narrative, the film explores the evolution of bathing culture and social morals in Germany. Set in a summer resort where traditional values clash with more liberal attitudes, it humorously reflects on changing ...

Bank Vault 713 (1958)

A man is unable to find a job. In his desperation, he plans to rob a bank together with a friend who works in a petrol station and feels tempted by the possibility of getting rich. Two different motivations drive these two good men into an immoral situatio ...

Sheriff Teddy (1957)

A story about thirteen years old Kalle who is moving with the family from West Berlin to East. ...

Lissy (1957)

In 1930s Berlin, a woman's life unravels as her unemployed husband succumbs to Nazi propaganda and joins the Storm Troopers, while her brother's anti-Nazi stance leads to his death, prompting her to confront her beliefs and make a risky choice. ...

Castles and Cottages (1957)

Lifelong hard work for the count makes the servant Anton a cripple. Everybody calls him Crooked Anton. When, after the end of the war, the land of the count gets divided amongst the farmers, Anton receives a piece and hopes to be able to work freely. But a ...

Michael Kramer (1955)

Du mein stilles Tal (1955)

Elisabeth, wife of a landowner, has kept from her husband for twenty years that their daughter is not his. Rather, she is the result of an affair with a musician she was dating shortly before their marriage. Now this man, by now a famous concert pianist, e ...

The Lady of Scuderi (1955)

Several men have been murdered lately, mostly rich lovers on their way to meet their mistresses with gifts of fine jewelry. To fight this scourge, King Louis XIV decides to create a special court named "La chambre ardente", designed to find and punish the ...

Anna Susanna (1953)

Destinies of Women (1952)

Berlin 1952, seven years after WWII. Four women are looking for a good man and happiness in the divided city. Their destinies are loosely connected through one person: the West Berlin dandy and womanizer, Conny. ...

Schatten über den Inseln (1952)

On the Faroe Islands, people eke out a meagre existence by catching birds. Merchant Brause pays them little and does a good business. This comes under threat when Dr. Sten Horn suspects that the dangerous annual plague, which kills dozens of inhabitants, i ...

Die Meere rufen (1951)

Film by Eduard Kubat. ...

The Sonnenbrucks (1951)

Professor Sonnenbruck is a scientist who is not particularly interested in politics. Even the meeting in 1943 with his former assistant Peters does not change him. He does not betray Peters, who has escaped from a concentration camp, but that is already en ...

Girls in Gingham (1949)

A moving saga focusing on the women in a family that spans three generations and almost 70 years of German history, from the Wilhelmine period through the end of WWII. This film shows that it takes a combination of hard work, political consciousness and fa ...

… und wenn’s nur einer wär’ … (1949)

The young actress Bettina has angered the director of a West Berlin camp for troubled youth with a song that celebrates the adventurous lives of these "wayward youths." Hein Denecke invites her to get to know the real lives of these young people. ...

Jan und die Schwindlerin (1947)

There's a great deal of excitement on a small North Sea island: A millionairess has arrived, accompanied by her elderly secretary. No one knows why the lady is vacationing here of all places. It's particularly strange that Ellinor, as the sophisticated cit ...

Meine vier Jungens (1944)

Anna Christiansen has not heard from her husband Klaus, a sailor, for twelve years. To provide a secure life for her three sons, Anna has taken over a sailors' home. Since then, she has led a modest but contented life. One day, Klaus suddenly appears at he ...

An Old Heart Becomes Young Again (1943)

All throughout his entire life, Friedrich Wilhelm Hoffmann let his career run roughshod over his personal life. He had no wife, because he was married instead to his chocolate factory. Now he's old and gray, and his relatives, who are greedily waiting fo ...

With the Eyes of a Woman (1942)

A typical woman's fate at the turn of the century, from the first love mistake to the arranged marriage and further disappointments. ...

Weiße Wäsche (1942)

Musician Eduard Boeckel wants to settle down and marries laundry owner Lisbeth Timm. He brings his friend August Garfs into the marriage, and the housekeeper Alwine quickly sets her sights on him. In his new position, Boeckel invents a laundry detergent wi ...