''Prüfstand VII'' is a 2001 German

docudrama Docudrama (or documentary drama) is a genre of television show, television and feature film, film, which features Drama (film and television), dramatized Historical reenactment, re-enactments of actual events. It is described as a hybrid of docu ...

film by Robert Bramkamp, about the

V-2 The V2 (), with the technical name '' Aggregat-4'' (A4), was the world's first long-range guided ballistic missile. The missile, powered by a liquid-propellant rocket engine, was developed during the Second World War in Nazi Germany as a " ven ...

rocket and the rocket research in the

Peenemünde Army Research Center The Peenemünde Army Research Center (, HVP) was founded in 1937 as one of five military proving grounds under the German Army Weapons Office (''Heereswaffenamt''). Several German guided missiles and rockets of World War II were developed by ...

. The film deals with the

history of ideas Intellectual history (also the history of ideas) is the study of the history of human thought and of intellectuals, people who conceptualize, discuss, write about, and concern themselves with ideas. The investigative premise of intellectual hist ...

surrounding the rocket research and the conquest of space, with ''Bianca'' as the spirit of the rocket guiding the viewer around different aspects of rocket research. It is partly inspired by

Thomas Pynchon Thomas Ruggles Pynchon Jr. ( , ; born May 8, 1937) is an American novelist noted for his dense and complex novels. His fiction and non-fiction writings encompass a vast array of subject matter, Literary genre, genres and Theme (narrative), th ...

's novel ''

Gravity's Rainbow ''Gravity's Rainbow'' is a 1973 novel by the American writer Thomas Pynchon. The narrative is set primarily in Europe at the end of World War II and centers on the design, production and dispatch of V-2 rockets by the German military. In partic ...

'' and features dramatization of some selected scenes from the novel.

Cast

In alphabetical order * Hanjo Berressem as Dr. Spectro * Inga Busch as Bianca * Jeff Caster as Pointsman *

Robert Forster Robert Wallace Foster Jr. (July 13, 1941 – October 11, 2019), known professionally as Robert Forster, was an American actor. He made his screen debut as Private L.G. Williams in John Huston's '' Reflections in a Golden Eye'' (1967), followed ...

as Ferryman *

Matthias Fuchs Matthias Fuchs (1939–2001) was a German stage, film and television actor.Langford p.246 Partial filmography * '' The Immenhof Girls'' (1955) - Ethelbert * '' The First Day of Spring'' (1956) - Martin * ''Hochzeit auf Immenhof'' (1956) - Ethelb ...

as General Dornberger * Stefan Heidenreich *

Helmut Höge Helmut is a German name. Variants include Hellmut, Helmuth, and Hellmuth. From old German, the first element deriving from either ''heil'' ("healthy") or ''hiltja'' ("battle"), and the second from ''muot'' ("spirit, mind, mood"). Helmut may refer ...

as Journalist *

Friedrich Kittler Friedrich Adolf Kittler (June 12, 1943 – October 18, 2011) was a literary scholar and a media theorist. His works relate to Mass media, media, technology, and the military. Biography Friedrich Adolf Kittler was born in 1943 in Rochlitz in S ...

as Ghost *

Peter Lohmeyer Peter Lohmeyer (born 22 January 1962 in Niedermarsberg) is a German actor. He has appeared in more than one hundred films since 1980. Life and career Lohmeyer is the youngest of three children of the Protestant pastor Dieter Lohmeyer and his wi ...

Wernher von Braun Wernher Magnus Maximilian Freiherr von Braun ( ; ; 23 March 191216 June 1977) was a German–American aerospace engineer and space architect. He was a member of the Nazi Party and '' Allgemeine SS'', the leading figure in the development of ...

* Mario Mentrup as Minute Man * Michael Röhrenbach

References

External links

Official website
* 2000s German-language films 2000s German films 2000s war drama films German docudrama films German war drama films German World War II films Cultural depictions of Wernher von Braun Thomas Pynchon {{WWII-film-stub