Margarethe von Trotta (; born 21 February 1942) is a German film director, screenwriter, and actress. She has been referred to as a "leading force" of the
New German Cinema
New German Cinema (german: Neuer Deutscher Film) is a period in German cinema which lasted from 1962 to 1982, in which a new generation of directors emerged who, working with low budgets, and influenced by the French New Wave and Italian Neore ...
movement.
[Margarethe von Trotta](_blank)
at European Graduate School
The European Graduate School (EGS) is a private graduate school that operates in two locations: Saas-Fee, Switzerland, and Valletta, Malta.
History
It was founded in 1994 in Saas-Fee, Switzerland by the Swiss scientist, artist, and therapist, Pao ...
. Retrieved 14 May 2010. Von Trotta's extensive body of work has won awards internationally.
[ "Birds Eye View: Filmmaker Focus: Margarethe Von Trotta." 2011 Film Festival: Celebrating Women Filmmakers. Birds Eye View. Web. 2 May 2012.] She was married to and collaborated with director
Volker Schlöndorff
Volker Schlöndorff (; born 31 March 1939 Friday) is a German film director, screenwriter and producer who has worked in Germany, France and the United States. He was a prominent member of the New German Cinema of the late 1960s and early 1970s, ...
. Although they made a successful team, von Trotta felt she was seen as secondary to Schlöndorff.
Subsequently, she established a solo career for herself and became "Germany's foremost female film director, who has offered the most sustained and successful female variant of ''
Autorenkino'' in postwar German film history".
Certain aspects of von Trotta's work have been compared to
Ingmar Bergman's features from the 1960s and 1970s.
Von Trotta has been called "the world's leading
feminist
Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social equality of the sexes. Feminism incorporates the position that society prioritizes the male po ...
filmmaker".
The predominant aim of her films is to create new representations of women.
[ Eifler, Margret. "Margarethe Von Trotta as Filmmaker: Biographical Retrospectives." The German Quarterly 76.4 (2003): 443–48.] Her films are concerned with relationships between and among women (sisters, best friends, etc.), as well as with relationships between women and men, and include political settings. Nevertheless, she rejects the suggestion that she makes "women's films".
Early life
The child of Elisabeth von Trotta and painter
Alfred Roloff, she was born in
Berlin
Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...
. She and her mother moved to
Düsseldorf
Düsseldorf ( , , ; often in English sources; Low Franconian and Ripuarian: ''Düsseldörp'' ; archaic nl, Dusseldorp ) is the capital city of North Rhine-Westphalia, the most populous state of Germany. It is the second-largest city in th ...
after the end of
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
.
Von Trotta shared a strong bond with her mother in the absence of her father.
She has spoken about how her relationship with her mother gave her a sensitivity for friendships and solidarity between women, a theme that is seen in most of her films.
Von Trotta relocated to Paris in the 1960s, where she worked for film collectives, collaborating on scripts and co-directing short films.
In her early career, von Trotta was an actress, appearing in the early films of directors
Rainer Werner Fassbinder
Rainer Werner Fassbinder (; 31 May 1945 – 10 June 1982), sometimes credited as R. W. Fassbinder, was a German filmmaker. He is widely regarded as one of the major figures and catalysts of the New German Cinema movement.
Fassbinder's main ...
and
Volker Schlöndorff
Volker Schlöndorff (; born 31 March 1939 Friday) is a German film director, screenwriter and producer who has worked in Germany, France and the United States. He was a prominent member of the New German Cinema of the late 1960s and early 1970s, ...
. In one of many interviews, von Trotta said: "I came from Germany before the New Wave, so we had all these silly movies. Cinema for me was entertainment, but it was not art. When I came to Paris, I saw several films of
Ingmar Bergman
Ernst Ingmar Bergman (14 July 1918 – 30 July 2007) was a Swedish film director, screenwriter, Film producer, producer and playwright. Widely considered one of the greatest and most influential filmmakers of all time, his films are known ...
, and all of the sudden I understood what cinema could be. I saw the films of
Alfred Hitchcock
Sir Alfred Joseph Hitchcock (13 August 1899 – 29 April 1980) was an English filmmaker. He is widely regarded as one of the most influential figures in the history of cinema. In a career spanning six decades, he directed over 50 featur ...
and the
French Nouvelle Vague. I stood there and said, 'that is what I'd like to do with my life.' But that was 1962, and you couldn't think that a woman could be a director. In a way, as an unconscious act, I started acting and when the New German films started, I tried to get in through acting."
[ "Margarethe Von Trotta." German Flicks. HyperEd. Web. 2 May 2012.] Through her acting career, von Trotta was able to create an initial name for herself before becoming a director.
Career
Her first input on a film, before making a solo-career out of it, was on Volker Schlöndorff's ''
The Sudden Wealth of the Poor People of Kombach ''The Sudden Wealth of the Poor People of Kombach'' (german: Der plötzliche Reichtum der armen Leute von Kombach) is a film d'auteur from 1971 directed by Volker Schlöndorff. He also co-wrote the script with Margarethe von Trotta. The film was ...
''(1971), which she also acted in. In 1975, they proceeded to co-write and co-direct ''
The Lost Honor of Katharina Blum
''The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum, or: how violence develops and where it can lead'' (original German title: , ) is a 1974 novel by Heinrich Böll.
The story deals with the sensationalism of tabloid news and the political climate of panic ove ...
'' (''Die verlorene Ehre der Katharina Blum'') which was based on an adaptation of
Heinrich Böll
Heinrich Theodor Böll (; 21 December 1917 – 16 July 1985) was a German writer. Considered one of Germany's foremost post-World War II writers, Böll is a recipient of the Georg Büchner Prize (1967) and the Nobel Prize for Literature (1972).
...
's novel that dealt with "political repression in the Federal Republic".
[ Sklar, Robert. "Invaded by Memories of Germany's Past: An Interview with Margarethe Von Trotta." Cineaste 29.2 (2004): 10–12. Web. 3 May 2012.] Within this first film of von Trotta's, one can see the conflict "between the personal and the public" that resonates throughout her early film career.
The female characters within the story must occupy suffocating spaces that von Trotta uses to represent the confinement that women are subjected to in a world run by men.
Von Trotta was in charge of supervising the performance aspect while Schlöndorff dealt with the film's mechanics. As a director, he was not considered to be very audacious, while von Trotta's strong suit was in how she directed the film's actors "through whom she creates her story". Thus the two were able to complement each other. Their film was considered to be "the most successful German film of the mid-1970s". The couple collaborated on one more film, ''Coup de Grâce'' (1976), where von Trotta helped to write but not direct the work, before she branched off into her own career.
[Gollub, Christian-Albrecht. "Volker Schlöndorff and Margarethe Von Trotta: Transcending the Genres." New German Filmmakers: From Oberhausen through the 1970s. Ed. Klaus Phillips. New York: Ungar Pub., 1984. 266–302. Print.]
Trotta's first solo film was ''
The Second Awakening of Christa Klages'' (''Das zweite Erwachen der Christa Klages'') in 1978, which focused on "a young woman's political radicalization."
This film presented multiple subjects that von Trotta's films would be known for in the future: "female bonding, sisterhood, and the uses and effects of violence".
The film's script used real-life information about the seizure of school teacher Margit Czenki from Munich.
Throughout her years of filmmaking, von Trotta has addressed many points of special concern to women: "abortion, contraception, the situation of women at work, spousal abuse, and
hetraditional female role".
In 2001 she was the President of the Jury at the
23rd Moscow International Film Festival
The 23rd Moscow International Film Festival was held from 21 to 30 June 2001. The Golden St. George was awarded to the American film '' The Believer'' directed by Henry Bean.
Jury
* Margarethe von Trotta (Germany – President of the Jury)
* Jia ...
.
She is a Professor of Film at the
European Graduate School
The European Graduate School (EGS) is a private graduate school that operates in two locations: Saas-Fee, Switzerland, and Valletta, Malta.
History
It was founded in 1994 in Saas-Fee, Switzerland by the Swiss scientist, artist, and therapist, Pao ...
in
Saas-Fee
Saas-Fee () is the main village in the Saastal, or the Saas Valley, and is a municipality in the district of Visp in the canton of Valais in Switzerland.
The village is situated on a high mountain plateau at 1,800 meters (5,900 feet), surrounded ...
and remains an important personality of German cinema.
The Sister Films
Margarethe von Trotta's second feature film was ''
Sisters, or the Balance of Happiness'' (''Schwestern oder die Balance des Glücks'', 1979). Unintentionally, she created a "trilogy of sister films" with her succeeding works: ''
Marianne and Juliane
''Marianne and Juliane'' (german: Die bleierne Zeit; lit. "The Leaden Time" or "Leaden Times"), also called ''The German Sisters'' in the United Kingdom, is a 1981 West German film directed by Margarethe von Trotta. The screenplay is a fictionalize ...
'' (''Die Bleierne Zeit'', 1981) and ''
Three Sisters'' (''Fürchten und Lieben'', 1988).
Barbara Quart, author of the book ''Women Directors'', commented on the three works: "It is the quest for wholeness that is the preoccupation of von Trotta's entire sister series."
The women in these films are born into a traditional time (late 1940s and '50s), but they reject the positions that society has established for women.
As well, the topic of suicide plays an important role in the first two films and how the live sister connects to the dead one.
These three films investigate sisterhood and their bonds within a world that is falling apart all around them; this matter places von Trotta's work into New German Cinema.
''Sisters, or The Balance of Happiness'' delves into bonds, both physically and mentally, between sisters Maria and Anna, along with a third party.
The siblings are close before Anna commits suicide, but hidden behind her facial expressions is a desire to escape this feeling of frustration between following what she wants and what Maria asks of her.
Maria faces post suicide trauma, coping with her devastation by transplanting the memory of her sister onto her co-worker, Miriam. This ultimately leads Maria to deal with her inner issues so she can try to move on with her life in a peaceful manner.
This film garnered the Grand Prix Award at
Créteil International Women's Film Festival
The Créteil International Women's Film Festival (in French Festival international de films de femmes de Créteil) is an annual event in Créteil, France, founded by Jackie Buet in 1978 to showcase the directing talents of female filmmakers who, ...
in 1981.
''Marianne and Juliane'' (also known in English as ''The German Sisters'') (1981) also deals with losing a sister and learning how to handle the grief.
Marianne and Juliane grow much closer after Marianne is put behind bars for her radical, terrorist activities. After unexpected news of Marianne's death, Juliane becomes obsessed with finding out the truth behind the supposed suicide, which she does not believe to be true.
The characters are based on the real-life Christiane and
Gudrun Ensslin
Gudrun Ensslin (; 15 August 1940 – 18 October 1977) was a German far-left terrorist and founder of the West German far-left militant group Red Army Faction (, or RAF, also known as the Baader-Meinhof Gang).
After becoming involved with co-fou ...
, which made "feminist critics" give extra notice to this work in comparison to all other films that von Trotta has done. Critics question the way von Trotta structured the plot and why she positioned it from that of Christiane's character, Juliane, instead of from Gudrun (Marianne). The film is characterized by the use of multiple flashback sequences, jumping between present day to childhood and everywhere in between, breaking any chance of a linear structure.
[ Linville, Susan E. "Retrieving History: Margarethe Von Trotta's Marianne and Juliane." PMLA 106.3 (1991): 446–58.] In this film, it is predominantly the Nazi era that influences Marianne and Juliane, albeit in different ways.
[Gerhardt, Christina. “RAF as German and Family History: Von Trotta's Marianne and Juliane and Petzold's The State I Am in.” The Place of Politics in German Film. Ed. Martin Blumenthal-Barby (Bielefeld: Aisthesis, 2014). 166–184. Web. 7 August 2014.]![Margarethe von Trotta](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/84/Margarethe_von_Trotta.jpg)
A theme within ''Marianne and Juliane'' that von Trotta uses throughout her works is that of "the personal is political".
[Seiter, Ellen. "The Political Is Personal: Margarethe Von Trotta's 'Marianne and Juliane'" Films For Women. Ed. Charlotte Brunsdon. London: British Film Institute, 1986. Print.] In Marianne's jail cell, the sisters come to terms with "their personal and political differences".
One take on this theme is that Marianne's personal past has fostered her political, terrorist present. In the story's present day, her political actions effect her personal life: she is sentenced to prison and dies in her cell, her husband takes his own life, and her son is put in danger.
Not surprisingly, this film was the subject of much debate from conservatives who believed that Marianne's character as a terrorist was given too much understanding.
[ Skidmore, James M. "Intellectualism and Emotionalism in Margarethe Von Trotta's "Die Bleierne Zeit"" German Studies Review 25.3 (2002): 551–67.] This film won the AGIS Award, FIPRESCI Prize,
Golden Lion Award
The Golden Lion ( it, Leone d'oro) is the highest prize given to a film at the Venice Film Festival. The prize was introduced in 1949 by the organizing committee and is now regarded as one of the film industry's most prestigious and distinguishe ...
, New Cinema Award, and OCIC Award at the
Venice Film Festival
The Venice Film Festival or Venice International Film Festival ( it, Mostra Internazionale d'Arte Cinematografica della Biennale di Venezia, "International Exhibition of Cinematographic Art of the Venice Biennale") is an annual film festival he ...
in 1981, along with a few more listed in the awards section.
Von Trotta winning the Golden Lion was a true achievement for women in film, for an honor of this stature had not been awarded to a female director since
Leni Reifenstahl
Helene Bertha Amalie "Leni" Riefenstahl (; 22 August 1902 – 8 September 2003) was a German film director, photographer and actress known for her role in producing Nazi propaganda.
A talented swimmer and an artist, Riefenstahl also became in ...
received "the Mussolini Cup" in 1938 for ''Olympia''.
In 1994
Ingmar Bergman
Ernst Ingmar Bergman (14 July 1918 – 30 July 2007) was a Swedish film director, screenwriter, Film producer, producer and playwright. Widely considered one of the greatest and most influential filmmakers of all time, his films are known ...
listed it as one of his favorite 11 films of all time.
''Love and Fear'' or ''Paura e amore'' (in Italy), also known as ''Trois Soeurs'' (in France) or Three Sisters (1988) — von Trotta's sixth feature-length film — focuses on a set of three sisters: Olga, Masha, and Irina. It is through these females that von Trotta is able to present her opinions concerning the stature of females in society and the traditional politics of the time that play a role in shaping their lives. Once again, this film deals with sisters who yearn for significance in all aspects of their lives (Rueschmann, 168). Their constant quest for love is the way they cope with the unfavorable aspects of life. Compared to the other two preceding films in the "sister series", ''Love and Fear'' contains key melodramatic elements that focus on one's feelings and anguish. It does not address politics as heavily as the other films, but more on von Trotta's take of the distinction between men and women in society.
[Rueschmann, Eva. "The Politics of Intersubjectivity: The Sister Films of Margarethe Von Trotta." Sisters On Screen: Siblings in Contemporary Cinema. Philadelphia: Temple UP, 2000. 147–75. Print.] This film was nominated for the
Palme d'Or
The Palme d'Or (; en, Golden Palm) is the highest prize awarded at the Cannes Film Festival. It was introduced in 1955 by the festival's organizing committee. Previously, from 1939 to 1954, the festival's highest prize was the Grand Prix du Fe ...
Award at the
Cannes Film Festival
The Cannes Festival (; french: link=no, Festival de Cannes), until 2003 called the International Film Festival (') and known in English as the Cannes Film Festival, is an annual film festival held in Cannes, France, which previews new films o ...
in 1988.
''Sheer Madness''
''
Sheer Madness
''Sheer Madness'' (german: Heller Wahn, and also released as ''Friends and Husbands'') is a 1983 German arthouse drama film directed by Margarethe von Trotta. It was entered into the 33rd Berlin International Film Festival.
Cast
* Hanna Schyg ...
'' (''Heller Wahn'', 1983), one of von Trotta's popular feature films, also uses suicide as an important part of the storyline. An analysis on the film given by authors Susan Linville and Kent Casper reads: "suicidal states of mind may stem not from negative distortions of external reality, but from an accurate assessment of the way things are."
[ Kuttenberg, Eva. "The Hidden Face of Narcissus: Suicide as Poetic Speech in Margarethe Von Trotta's Early Films." Women in German Yearbook: Feminist Studies in German Literature & Culture 20 (2004): 122–44.] Within this story, once again, women's feelings are investigated through the friendship between two females, Ruth and Olga.
This film gave the impression that, supposedly, von Trotta was a "man-hater."
Von Trotta won the OCIC Award-Honorable Mention at the
Berlin International Film Festival
The Berlin International Film Festival (german: Internationale Filmfestspiele Berlin), usually called the Berlinale (), is a major international film festival held annually in Berlin, Germany. Founded in 1951 and originally run in June, the festi ...
in the Forum of New Cinema for ''Sheer Madness'' in 1983. This film was also nominated for the
Golden Bear
The Golden Bear (german: Goldener Bär) is the highest prize awarded for the best film at the Berlin International Film Festival. The bear is the heraldic animal of Berlin, featured on both the coat of arms and flag of Berlin.
History
The winn ...
at the Berlin International Film Festival in the same year.
''Rosa Luxemburg''
Von Trotta's 1986 eponymous film about the feminist and marxist socialist
Rosa Luxemburg
Rosa Luxemburg (; ; pl, Róża Luksemburg or ; 5 March 1871 – 15 January 1919) was a Polish and naturalised-German revolutionary socialist, Marxist philosopher and anti-war activist. Successively, she was a member of the Proletariat party, ...
examines both her "life as a public revolutionary and her private experience as a woman".
[http://sensesofcinema.com/2002/great-directors/von_trotta/ Andac, Ben. "Margarethe Von Trotta." Senses of Cinema. Web. 4 May 2012.] Barbara Sukowa, who stars in several of von Trotta's films, won the Best Actress honors at Cannes in 1986 for her delivery of the main role. Through her cinematic vision, von Trotta returns to the theme of "the political and the personal", giving fair attention to both Luxemburg's personal life as a female in society and her political life as a "public revolutionary".
''Rosa Luxemburg'' was nominated for the
Palme d'Or
The Palme d'Or (; en, Golden Palm) is the highest prize awarded at the Cannes Film Festival. It was introduced in 1955 by the festival's organizing committee. Previously, from 1939 to 1954, the festival's highest prize was the Grand Prix du Fe ...
at
Cannes Film Festival
The Cannes Festival (; french: link=no, Festival de Cannes), until 2003 called the International Film Festival (') and known in English as the Cannes Film Festival, is an annual film festival held in Cannes, France, which previews new films o ...
in 1986. This film won the Guild Film Award-Gold at the Guild of German Art House Cinemas in German Film in 1987.
''Rosenstrasse''
Looking forward to some of von Trotta's more contemporary films, this same idea of female bonds and their emotions is still center stage, such as in her piece from 2003, ''
Rosenstrasse''. The film uses melodramatic elements, like in ''Paura e amore'' (1988), to express the emotions of the characters. The difference here is that ''Rosenstrasse'' is a "maternal melodrama."
[Parkinson, Anna M. "Neo-Feminist Mütterfilm? The Emotional Politics of Margarethe Von Trotta's 'Rosenstrasse'" The Collapse of the Conventional: German Film and Its Politics at the Turn of the Twenty-First Century. Ed. Jaimey Fisher and Brad Prager. Detroit: Wayne State UP, 2010. Print.] There are three overlapping familial connections involving "mother-daughter relationships" within the story: "the bond between Hannah, a first-generation Jewish American, and her mother Ruth"; "the...mother-daughter bond between Ruth and her Jewish mother Miriam"; "and...the central relationship between surrogate mother Lena von Eschenbach/Fisher and Ruth."
In this, the definition of a mother is stretched from the "biological" standpoint to the "symbolic."
''Vision''
The film ''
Vision
Vision, Visions, or The Vision may refer to:
Perception Optical perception
* Visual perception, the sense of sight
* Visual system, the physical mechanism of eyesight
* Computer vision, a field dealing with how computers can be made to gain un ...
'' (2009) chronicles the true tale of
Hildegard von Bingen
Hildegard of Bingen (german: Hildegard von Bingen; la, Hildegardis Bingensis; 17 September 1179), also known as Saint Hildegard and the Sibyl of the Rhine, was a German Benedictine abbess and polymath active as a writer, composer, philosopher ...
, a nun who stands for another of von Trotta's independent women protagonists—one who fights the patriarchal society of the church by foregoing the established rules of conduct and, upon learning one of her fellow sisters is with child, asks for a different area for the nuns to call their own. In an interview between von Trotta and Damon Smith from Filmmaker Magazine, von Trotta explains her choice for the subject of her film: "When I'm searching for a woman in the very distant past, I look for a woman who is in a way near to my own vision...I am always attracted by a woman who has to fight for her own life and her own reality, who has to get out of a certain situation of imprisonment, to free
erself That is perhaps the main theme in all my films."
[http://www.filmmakermagazine.com/news/2010/10/margarethe-von-trotta-vision/ Smith, Damon. "MARGARETHE VON TROTTA, "VISION" , Filmmaker Magazine." Filmmaker: The Magazine of Independent Film. Filmmaker Magazine, 13 October 2010. Web. 5 May 2012.]
Again, a deep bond is witnessed in this story, as in the rest of von Trotta's films, between Hildegard and a young nun, Richardis. Continuing with the interview, von Trotta says, "It's not a lesbian love! At one point she
ildegardsays, ‘She is my mother and I'm her mother, I'm her daughter and she's my daughter.’ Hildegard couldn't have children, so in a way Richardis is her daughter and friend and mother
ll at once it's a very deep love."
Von Trotta wanted to make a film with a female protagonist that viewers could relate to instead of looking at her from below, as she clarifies in an interview with Zeitgeist Films:
:The figures that appeal to me are always strong women who also have moments of weakness; therefore, I never try to make heroines out of them. Instead I show how they fought to find their own way, how they put themselves out there, and how much they had to swallow in order to find themselves. I am fascinated by how they overcome obstacles in order to achieve their goals. Hildegard von Bingen had a dream of founding her own abbey, and she suffered a lot of setbacks in the process. The moments of her greatest weakness are when the nun Richardis is to be taken away from her. In this situation, she behaves either like a small, abandoned child, or with fury. This conduct is all recorded in her letters. And it is precisely these moments of extreme self-abandonment that I find so beautiful, surprising, and contradictory. Hildegard von Bingen demands for herself what she usually gives to others. I absolutely did not want to portray her as a saint.
[http://www.spiritualityandpractice.com/films/features.php?id=20271 "An Interview with Margarethe Von Trotta: Director of ‘Vision’" Interview by Zeitgeist Films. Spirituality Practice. Zeitgeist Films. Web. 3 May 2012.]
''Hannah Arendt''
''
Hannah Arendt
Hannah Arendt (, , ; 14 October 1906 – 4 December 1975) was a political philosopher, author, and Holocaust survivor. She is widely considered to be one of the most influential political theorists of the 20th century.
Arendt was born ...
'' (2012) portrays an important segment in the life of the German-Jewish academic
Hannah Arendt
Hannah Arendt (, , ; 14 October 1906 – 4 December 1975) was a political philosopher, author, and Holocaust survivor. She is widely considered to be one of the most influential political theorists of the 20th century.
Arendt was born ...
.
[http://www.goethe.de/kue/flm/far/en8898031.htm Wydra, Thilo. "Margarethe Von Trotta on Hannah Arendt: 'Turning Thoughts into Images'" German Filmmakers and Movies. Goethe Institute. Web. 4 May 2012.] In an interview with Thilo Wydra, von Trotta is asked if Arendt is similar to the women she has portrayed in past films. Von Trotta replies with an explanation about how real-life characters from her past films, ''Rosa Luxemburg'' and ''Die bleierne Zeit'' (''Marianne and Juliane''), fought and died for causes they found to be right: Luxemburg wanted more equality in her community, and
Gudrun Ensslin
Gudrun Ensslin (; 15 August 1940 – 18 October 1977) was a German far-left terrorist and founder of the West German far-left militant group Red Army Faction (, or RAF, also known as the Baader-Meinhof Gang).
After becoming involved with co-fou ...
(Marianne) wanted to revolutionize humanity. Von Trotta says, "Hannah Arendt is a woman who fits into my personal mold of historically important women that I have portrayed in my films. ‘I want to understand,’ was one of her guiding principles. I feel that applies to myself and my films as well.
Television work
The common problem that filmmakers run into is budget issues and where they get their funds; during the mid-eighties, many films went under due to money cuts by the "German subvention system." Several of von Trotta's fellow women filmmakers took the safe route and went into the education field in media. But not Margarethe von Trotta—to stay in the game, she accepted proposals for TV pieces, even if it meant losing a bit of her artistic allowances.
Her first piece for television was ''Winterkind'' (1997), which was the first time she did not compose the screenplay for a work she was directing. She followed this with three more TV films: ' (1997), ' (1997), and ' (2000). Through her experience of working in television, von Trotta learned how to try to hold on to her stamp as an "independent filmmaker" in terms of keeping her artistic approach.
Personal life
In 1964, von Trotta married Jürgen Moeller and had one son, German documentary director Felix Moeller. They divorced in 1968 and von Trotta married German filmmaker Volker Schlöndorff. Together, they raised Felix and worked together on film projects. Von Trotta and Schlöndorff's film collaboration in Germany during the politically turbulent 1970s is documented in Felix's 2018 film ''Sympathisanten: Unser Deutscher Herbst'' ("Sympathizers: our German Spring").
Filmography
Feature films
Television films and series
* ''Winterkind'' (1997, TV film)
* ' (1998, TV film)
* ' (1999, TV film)
* ' (2000, TV miniseries)
* ''Die andere Frau'' (''The Other Woman'', 2004, TV film)
* ''
Tatort
''Tatort'' ("Crime scene") is a German language police procedural television series that has been running continuously since 1970 with some 30 feature-length episodes per year, which makes it the longest-running German TV drama. Developed by ...
: Unter uns'' (2007, TV series episode)
* ''Die Schwester'' (2010, TV film)
* '': La fuga di Teresa'' (2012, TV series episode)
Actress
* ' (1967), as Gaby
* ' (1969), as Helga
* ' (1969, TV film), as Anka
* ''
Baal
Baal (), or Baal,; phn, , baʿl; hbo, , baʿal, ). ( ''baʿal'') was a title and honorific meaning "owner", "lord" in the Northwest Semitic languages spoken in the Levant during Ancient Near East, antiquity. From its use among people, it cam ...
'' (1970, TV film), as Sophie
* ''
Gods of the Plague
''Gods of the Plague'' (german: Götter der Pest) is a 1970 West German black-and-white drama film directed by Rainer Werner Fassbinder.
Plot
After his release from prison, ex-convict Franz Walsch finds his way back into the Munich criminal underw ...
'' (1970), as Margarethe
* ''
The American Soldier
''The American Soldier'' (german: Der amerikanische Soldat) is a 1970 West German film written and directed by Rainer Werner Fassbinder. The film stars Karl Scheydt as Ricky, a German-American Vietnam veteran, who takes a job as a hired assassin ...
'' (1970), as Chambermaid
* ''
The Sudden Wealth of the Poor People of Kombach ''The Sudden Wealth of the Poor People of Kombach'' (german: Der plötzliche Reichtum der armen Leute von Kombach) is a film d'auteur from 1971 directed by Volker Schlöndorff. He also co-wrote the script with Margarethe von Trotta. The film was ...
'' (1971), as Sophie
* ''
Warnung vor einer heiligen Nutte'' (1971), as Babs
* ''
The Morals of Ruth Halbfass
''The Morals of Ruth Halbfass'' (german: Die Moral der Ruth Halbfass) is a 1972 West German drama film directed by Volker Schlöndorff and starring Senta Berger, Peter Ehrlich and Helmut Griem.Moeller & Lellis p.100
Cast
References
Bibliogra ...
'' (1972), as Doris Vogelsang
* ''A Free Woman'' (1972), as Elisabeth Junker
* ''Desaster'' (1973, TV film), as Ulla Werther
* ''Übernachtung in Tirol'' (1974, TV film), as Katja
* ''Die Atlantikschwimmer'' (1976), as Swimming instructor
* ''Das Andechser Gefühl'' (1976), as Movie star
* ''
Coup de Grâce
A coup de grâce (; 'blow of mercy') is a death blow to end the suffering of a severely wounded person or animal. It may be a mercy killing of mortally wounded civilians or soldiers, friends or enemies, with or without the sufferer's consent.
...
'' (1976), as Sophie von Reval
* ' (1977)
* ' (1984, TV film), as Jutta
Awards and nominations
1972:
*Won Critics Award at German Critics Association Awards in Film.
1981:
*Won Grand Prix Award at
Créteil International Women's Film Festival
The Créteil International Women's Film Festival (in French Festival international de films de femmes de Créteil) is an annual event in Créteil, France, founded by Jackie Buet in 1978 to showcase the directing talents of female filmmakers who, ...
for ''Sisters, or The Balance of Happiness'' (1979).
*Won Critics Award at the German Critics Association Awards in Film.
*Won Honorable Mention at
Valladolid International Film Festival
The Valladolid International Film Festival, popularly known as Seminci (short for ; ), is a film festival held annually in Valladolid, Spain. First held in 1956 as ('Valladolid Religious Film Week'), the Seminci is one of the longest-standing fi ...
for ''Marianne and Juliane'' (1981).
*Won AGIS Award, FIPRESCI Prize, Golden Lion Award, New Cinema Award, and OCIC Award at
Venice Film Festival
The Venice Film Festival or Venice International Film Festival ( it, Mostra Internazionale d'Arte Cinematografica della Biennale di Venezia, "International Exhibition of Cinematographic Art of the Venice Biennale") is an annual film festival he ...
for ''Marianne and Juliane'' (1981).
1982:
*Won David Award at
David di Donatello Awards
The David di Donatello Awards, named after Donatello's ''David'', a symbolic statue of the Italian Renaissance, are film awards given out each year by the ''Accademia del Cinema Italiano'' (The Academy of Italian Cinema). There are 26 award cat ...
in Best Foreign Director for ''Marianne and Juliane'' (1981).
*Nominated for David Award at David di Donatello Awards in Best Foreign Film for ''Marianne and Juliane'' (1981).
1983:
*Won OCIC Award-Honorable Mention at
Berlin International Film Festival
The Berlin International Film Festival (german: Internationale Filmfestspiele Berlin), usually called the Berlinale (), is a major international film festival held annually in Berlin, Germany. Founded in 1951 and originally run in June, the festi ...
in Forum of New Cinema for ''Sheer Madness'' (1983).
*Nominated for Golden Berlin Bear at Berlin International Film Festival for ''Sheer Madness'' (1983).
1986:
*Nominated for Palme d'Or at Cannes Film Festival for ''Rosa Luxemburg'' (1986).
1987:
*Won Guild Film Award-Gold at Guild of German Art House Cinemas in German Film for ''Rosa Luxemburg'' (1986).
1988:
*Nominated for Palme d'Or at
Cannes Film Festival
The Cannes Festival (; french: link=no, Festival de Cannes), until 2003 called the International Film Festival (') and known in English as the Cannes Film Festival, is an annual film festival held in Cannes, France, which previews new films o ...
for ''Love and Fear'' (1988).
1989:
*Won Special Film Award '40th Anniversary of the Federal Republic of Germany' at
German Film Awards
German(s) may refer to:
* Germany (of or related to)
**Germania (historical use)
* Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language
** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law
**Ger ...
for ''Marianne and Juliane'' (1981).
1993:
*Won Most Popular Film and Prize of the Ecumenical Jury at
Montreal World Film Festival
The Montreal World Film Festival (WFF; french: le Festival des Films du Monde) was one of Canada's oldest international film festivals and the only competitive film festival in North America accredited by the FIAPF (although the Toronto Internat ...
for ''Il Lungo Silenzio'' (1993).
1994:
*Won Career Award at Flaiano International Prizes in Cinema.
1995:
*Won Bavarian Film Award at
Bavarian Film Awards
The Bavarian Film Awards (german: Bayerischer Filmpreis) have been awarded annually since 1979 by the state government of Bavaria in Germany for “exceptional achievement in German filmmaking.” Along with the German Film Awards, these are th ...
in Best Direction for ''The Promise'' (1995).
*Won Guild Film Award-Gold at Guild of German Art House Cinemas in German Film for ''The Promise'' (1995).
2000:
*Won Audience Camera Award at Golden Camera, Germany for ''Days of Darkness'' (1999, TV).
2001:
*Won Special Mention at Biarritz International Festival of Audiovisual Programming in TV Series and Serials for ''Anniversaries'' (2000).
2003:
*Won SIGNIS Award-Honorable Mention and UNICEF Award at Venice Film Festival for ''Rosenstrasse'' (2003).
*Nominated for Golden Lion Award at Venice Film Festival for ''Rosentrasse'' (2003).
2004:
*Won David Award at David di Donatello Awards in Best European Film for ''Rosenstrasse'' (2003). (tied with ''Dogville'' (2003)).
*Won Golden Globe Award at Golden Globes, Italy, in Best European Film for ''Rosentrasse'' (2003).
*Won Honorary Award at Hessian Film Awards.
*Won Taormina Arte Award at Taormina International Film Festival.
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Awards for Margarethe von Trotta.
2012: Awarded the
Leo Baeck Medal
The Leo Baeck Medal has been awarded since 1978 by the Leo Baeck Institute of New York City, an international research institute devoted to the study of the history and culture of German-speaking Jewry. It is the highest recognition the Institute b ...
.
2019: Awarded honorary lifetime prize at German Film Awards.
Further reading
Further reading
*Andac, Ben. "Margarethe Von Trotta." Senses of Cinema. Web. 4 May 2012.
.
*"Awards for Margarethe Von Trotta." IMDb. IMDb.com. Web. 2 May 2012.
.
*"Birds Eye View: Filmmaker Focus: Margarethe Von Trotta." 2011 Film Festival: Celebrating Women Filmmakers. Birds Eye View. Web. 2 May 2012. .
*Eifler, Margret. "Margarethe Von Trotta as Filmmaker: Biographical Retrospectives." The German Quarterly 76.4 (2003): 443–48. .
*Gerhardt, Christina. “RAF as German and Family History: Von Trotta's Marianne and Juliane and Petzold's The State I Am in.” The Place of Politics in German Film. Ed. Martin Blumenthal-Barby (Bielefeld: Aisthesis, 2014). 166–184. Print.
*Gollub, Christian-Albrecht. "Volker Schlöndorff and Margarethe Von Trotta: Transcending the Genres." New German Filmmakers: From Oberhausen through the 1970s. Ed. Klaus Phillips. New York: Ungar Pub., 1984. 266–302. Print.
*"An Interview with Margarethe Von Trotta: Director of ‘Vision’" Interview by Zeitgeist Films. Spirituality Practice. Zeitgeist Films. Web. 3 May 2012. .
*Kuttenberg, Eva. "The Hidden Face of Narcissus: Suicide as Poetic Speech in Margarethe Von Trotta's Early Films." Women in German Yearbook: Feminist Studies in German Literature & Culture 20 (2004): 122–44. .
*Linville, Susan E. "Retrieving History: Margarethe Von Trotta's Marianne and Juliane." PMLA 106.3 (1991): 446–58. .
*"Margarethe Von Trotta." German Flicks. HyperEd. Web. 2 May 2012. .
*"Margarethe Von Trotta." IMDb. IMDb.com. Web. 6 May 2012. .
*Parkinson, Anna M. "Neo-Feminist Mütterfilm? The Emotional Politics of Margarethe Von Trotta's 'Rosenstrasse'" The Collapse of the Conventional: German Film and Its Politics at the Turn of the Twenty-First Century. Ed. Jaimey Fisher and Brad Prager. Detroit: Wayne State UP, 2010. Print.
*Prot, Bénédicte. "Von Trotta to Start Shooting Hannah Arendt Biopic." Cineuropa. German Films. Web. 4 May 2012. .
*Rueschmann, Eva. "The Politics of Intersubjectivity: The Sister Films of Margarethe Von Trotta." Sisters On Screen: Siblings in Contemporary Cinema. Philadelphia: Temple UP, 2000. 147–75. Print.
*Seiter, Ellen. "The Political Is Personal: Margarethe Von Trotta's 'Marianne and Juliane'" Films For Women. Ed. Charlotte Brunsdon. London: British Film Institute, 1986. Print.
*Skidmore, James M. "Intellectualism and Emotionalism in Margarethe Von Trotta's "Die Bleierne Zeit"" German Studies Review 25.3 (2002): 551–67. .
*Sklar, Robert. "Invaded by Memories of Germany's Past: An Interview with Margarethe Von Trotta." Cineaste 29.2 (2004): 10–12. Web. 3 May 2012. .
*Smith, Damon. "MARGARETHE VON TROTTA, "VISION" , Filmmaker Magazine." Filmmaker: The Magazine of Independent Film. Filmmaker Magazine, 13 October 2010. Web. 5 May 2012. .
*Wydra, Thilo. "Margarethe Von Trotta on Hannah Arendt: 'Turning Thoughts into Images'" German Filmmakers and Movies. Goethe Institute. Web. 4 May 2012. .
External links
Margarethe von Trotta
at European Graduate School
The European Graduate School (EGS) is a private graduate school that operates in two locations: Saas-Fee, Switzerland, and Valletta, Malta.
History
It was founded in 1994 in Saas-Fee, Switzerland by the Swiss scientist, artist, and therapist, Pao ...
. Biography and filmography.
*
"Birds Eye View: Filmmaker Focus: Margarethe Von Trotta."
Senses of Cinema: Great Directors Critical Database
"Invaded by Memories of Germany's Past: An Interview with Margarethe Von Trotta."
, "MARGARETHE VON TROTTA, 'VISION' , Filmmaker Magazine."
"An Interview with Margarethe Von Trotta: Director of ‘Vision’"
"Von Trotta to Start Shooting Hannah Arendt Biopic."
*
* ttps://www.imdb.com/name/nm0903137/awards Awards for Margarethe von Trotta
"CAREER ACHIEVEMENT TRIBUTE: MARGARETHE VON TROTTA"
"What Goes Around: Margarethe von Trotta's History Plays"
{{DEFAULTSORT:Trotta, Margarethe Von
1942 births
David di Donatello winners
European Graduate School faculty
Mass media people from Berlin
German expatriates in Russia
German expatriates in Switzerland
Living people
Members of the Academy of Arts, Berlin
Officers Crosses of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany
Directors of Golden Lion winners
German film directors
German women screenwriters