The Escape in the Silent

The Escape in the Silent (German: Flucht ins Schweigen)[1] is an East German black-and-white film, directed by Siegfried Hartmann. It was released in 1966.

The Escape in the Silent
Flucht ins Schweigen
Directed bySiegfried Hartmann
Written byEdmund Kiehl
Produced byAlexander Lösche, Horst Klein
StarringFritz Diez, Dieter Wien
CinematographyRolf Sohre
Edited byHelga Emmrich
Music byKarl Schinsky
Production
company
Distributed byProgress Film
Release date
27 May 1966
Running time
83 minutes
CountryEast Germany
LanguageGerman

Plot

Construction works carried out in a small village in Thuringia reveal the corpse of a member of the Waffen-SS, who seems to have been buried during the end of the Second World War - although no fighting took place in the area. Two forensics experts from the People's Police Investigations Department, Stetter and Hoffmann, arrive in the village to determine the death cause. At first, they suspect the owner of the lands in which the body was discovered; but after questioning him, he is murdered. A golden coin they found leads them to a local woman named Helga, and they reveal the truth behind the matter.

Cast
  • Fritz Diez as Stetter
  • Dieter Wien as Hoffmann
  • Marita Böhme as Helga Klink
  • Regine Albrecht as Inge Klink
  • Jiří Vršťala as Wills
  • Hans-Joachim Hanisch as Zschunke
  • Hans Hardt-Hardtloff as Schindler
  • Karlheinz Liefers as priest
  • Wolfgang Brunecker as Möller
  • Rolf Ludwig as Karl Reinhold
  • Horst Schön as SS man
  • Ernst-Georg Schwill as police clerk
  • Siegfried Weiß as jeweler
  • Günter Sonnenberg as Heinz Klink
  • Willi Neuenhahn as the wheelwright

Production

The script was based on Wolfgang Held's novel, The Death Pays with Ducats, published at 1964.[1]

Reception

At 1966, Albert Wilkening wrote that "this thriller continues the honored tradition of DEFA, by combining the genre with contemporary issues, as well as an important historical and political background."[2] The Eulenspiegel magazine's reviewer commented that "Finally... One must see the film, for the sake of the elusive culmination of its plot."[3] The German Film Lexicon regarded it as "a criminal drama, the powerful statement of which is weakened by formalistic deficiencies."[4]

References
  1. Flucht ins Schweigen on DEFA Foundation's website.
  2. Andrea Guder. Genosse Hauptmann auf Verbrecherjagd: der Krimi in Film und Fernsehen der DDR. ARCult Media (2003). ISBN 978-3-930395-34-7. Page 190.
  3. Eulenspiegel Magazine, 1966. ISSN 0423-5975. Page 24.
  4. Flucht ins Schweigen on zweitausendundeins.de.
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