Good Bye, Lenin!
This is a terrific and heartwarming comedy about the fall of the wall and the GDR, German reunification, and in time becomes a poignant tale of a son's love for his socialist mom. The mother, touchingly portrayed by Katrine Sass, turns her interest to the socialist government after her husband leaves her with two kids, defecting to the west.
One day she has a heart attack while witnessing a demonstration of students at the wall, and goes into a coma just when history is about to be made; she misses the collapse of the wall and the East German government. When she awakens (now in just Germany), her kids go to great extremes to hide the world-changing events from her, with hilarious results. A filmmaking buddy of the son, lovingly played by Daniel Bruhl, helps them in a way I won't spoil. You'll never see a son, go through this much out of love for his mother. A totally original story, reminds one of the old classic comedies, and like those, its a film you can watch again and again. One of the best German films.
This film still has a popular web site:
Good Bye Lenin Website
Other great German films: Nowhere in Africa, The Lives of Others (both Oscar® winners for foreign film), and Werner Herzog's Fitzcarraldo
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