That the Germans have truly made peace with history is demonstrated, if proof were still needed, by this From Hilde with Love by Andreas Dresen (Grill Point, Rabiye Kurnaz vs. George W. Bush), which returns to competition at the 74th /th edition of the Berlin Film Festival with a period drama that tells with extreme crudeness the story of a couple from the Rote Kapelle (name given by the Gestapo to the spy networks in favor of the Soviet Union) who fall in love before their lives are destroyed by Nazism.
At the center of everything is the heroine Hilde Coppi, played by an extraordinary Liv Lisa Fries who deserves the Bear.
Next to her is Hans (Johannes Hegemann), her great love and companion in the resistance.
When the two are captured by the Gestapo and Hilde, eight months pregnant, is imprisoned, the most painful of hells begins for her and for those who watch.
A true horror is both her imprisonment and her giving birth in her cell as well as the inevitable farewell to her son when she will have to suffer the most hasty and terrible of executions (images bordering on the sustainable).
Dresen however stages this story where, at least some Nazis are less evil than usual.
"I tried to avoid clichés. The prison warden and other characters are not pure, hard Nazis, but are just people who have adapted to obeying the system. They are people who could still live today. In short, I didn't want to historicize , but if anything de-historicize".
The young actress Liv Lisa Fries - protagonist of the phenomenon series Babylon Berlin and who will soon star alongside Anthony Hopkins in Freud - met Hans Coppi Jr before filming began.
That is, the son of the spouses protagonists of the story who became a well-known scholar and who today, eighty-one years old, helped Fries to understand the particular historical moment of those years in a very empathetic and emotional meeting.
"It was immense - says the actress - the sense of responsibility I felt towards Hans jr, who dedicated his life to remembering his parents, despite being traumatized by never having met them".
"It was immense - says the actress - the sense of responsibility I felt towards Hans jr, who dedicated his life to remembering his parents, despite being traumatized by never having met them".
He adds: "She was a full-fledged politician simply by being who she was, full of heart and consideration and love for her husband and the outside world. Her strength lies in her actual actions rather than her intentions. This is incredibly powerful."
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