• Film

The Second Awakening of Christa Klages

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Time Out says

Few film-makers wear their hearts as openly on their sleeves as Margarethe von Trotta, and her fascination with women (their relationships with each other and their definition - often redefinition - of themselves) is as apparent in this, her first solo feature, as it was in the later The German Sisters or Friends and Husbands. Christa Klages (Engel) is a young mother who turns terrorist and bank robber to prevent the closure of a crêche which she helps to run and her daughter attends. On the run with her friend and sometime lover, Christa is pursued by the police, and more mysteriously by a young woman (Thalbach) who was her hostage in the bank raid. What von Trotta has to say about her women is compelling, and she remains one of the few film-makers to portray terrorists convincingly. But the enigma of the hostage runs through the film as elusively as a character in a dream - vitally important at any given moment, but irritatingly meaningless when taken as a whole - and undermines the conviction of this feminist thriller which is otherwise so gloriously rooted in West Germany's present.

Release Details

  • Duration:93 mins

Cast and crew

  • Director:Margarethe von Trotta
  • Screenwriter:Margarethe von Trotta, Luisa Francia
  • Cast:
    • Tina Engel
    • Sylvia Reize
    • Katharina Thalbach
    • Marius Müller-Westernhagen
    • Peter Schneider
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