Coming Out
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Movie Reviews of Coming Out
Movie Review: Sexuality, romance and politics in superb East German drama
Summary: 4 Stars
COMING OUT
(E.Germany - 1989)
Aspect ratio: 1.66:1
Theatrical soundtrack: Mono
Demonstrating that love can blossom unexpectedly even under the most adverse social conditions, the late Heiner Carow's award-winning and hugely impressive COMING OUT was filmed in communist East Berlin whilst homosexuality was still a criminal offence on that side of the Wall. Matthias Freihof plays a bright, attractive schoolteacher whose affair with a female colleague (Dagmar Manzel) is interrupted when Freihof falls in love with a beautiful young man (Dirk Kummer) whom he meets after stumbling into an illicit gay bar. Given that most gay teachers aren't exactly welcomed in even the most 'open' societies, it's inevitable that the enforced suppression of Freihof's true nature should result in the cruel deceit which he practices on the two people he loves most, with equally inevitable consequences if the truth should ever come out. In the end, it's left to an elderly patron of the gay bar (Werner Dissell) to put Freihof's problems into perspective by reminding him of a time in Germany fifty years earlier when things were much, MUCH worse for gay people...
Carow was a veteran writer-director whose career stretched back to the 1950s, but this was his first attempt to tackle the problems faced by gay people under his homeland's oppressive regime. Forsaking shrill melodrama for coolly understated realism, he simply points the camera at a superb cast of talented actors and allows them to develop their characters on the foundations of Wolfram Witt's excellent script: Freihof carries the picture as an essentially decent man whose fears of legal redress provides the linchpin of the entire narrative; Kummer is the romantic teenager whose tragic past sends him in search of true love (watch him carefully in the scene directly after his lovemaking with Freihof, when he asks if they will meet again - there is such hope and longing in his beautiful face); and Manzel is dignified in the thankless role of Freihof's uncomprehending girlfriend, the one with most to lose as a result of her lover's deceit.
Filmed in and around some of the illegal gay bars which proliferated in East Berlin at the time, Carow charts the burgeoning romance between Freihof and Kummer with a tenderness that almost completely eludes the 'pretend' relationship with Manzel. But while the film is defiantly romantic at heart, it's also unflinchingly honest in its depiction of political repression at even the most basic level (in class, Freihof teaches individualism and freedom of thought, whilst concealing his sexual identity for fear of reprisals). As such, the film's conclusion may seem a little abrupt, even arbitrary, to some viewers, but it actually represents the true dawning of a whole new chapter for the central characters. In fact, Freihof's closing declaration - a single word, with countless implications - must have seemed especially liberating to those who caught the film's theatrical premiere in Germany on the same day the Berlin Wall came down, ending years of repression at a stroke. Long after the political tyrants of our world are gone, movies like this one will stand like stone, bearing witness to unkind history. A must-see.
NB. Some interesting trivia: Firstly, though often cited as the first and only gay film from communist East Germany, COMING OUT was actually preceded by Wieland Speck's WESTLER (1985), a desperately awkward West German drama concerning a love affair between two young men living on opposite sides of the Wall, which utilized clandestine footage secretly recorded in East Berlin. And secondly, the medical staff in the opening sequence of COMING OUT are genuine, and poor Dirk Kummer appears to be having his stomach pumped FOR REAL! Talk about dedication to your craft...!!
Movie Review: A Testament of a Time Capsule - that hasn't totally dissolved!
Summary: 4 Stars
COMING OUT is a seventeen-year-old movie, created in East Germany while under Communist rule, about the dangerous milieu in which gay men closeted their identity. It is a stunning achievement in that it presents the agony of coming to grips with sexual identity in a suppressive atmosphere, opening to public viewing the night the Berlin Wall tumbled. With this knowledge the story of these people is all the more heartbreaking with the chance that life for each character would have been different if told a few months later! The real tragedy is that the story is timeless and universal: the trauma of young people coming out is still potentially as wracked with anguish as the trauma of this film.
Philipp (handsome young Matthias Freihof) is a popular high school teacher, tightly in the closet, who happens to bump into (literally) an open and needy pretty girl Tanya (Dagmar Manzel) who immediately invites him to her apartment and introduces him to her bed. They form a comfortable bond, Philipp thinking his sexual identity problem is solved. Then Tanya brings home an old friend, Redford, who Philipp instantly recognizes as a boy with whom he has had hidden sex in the past. Old feelings are aroused and Philipp runs into the night only to end up in a secretive gay bar where he meets Matthias (handsome young Dirk Kummer) invites him home, and in a beautifully captured moment has a wholly satisfying physical encounter. Both men are enraptured.
Philipp returns to Tanya who questions his evenings' whereabouts and Philipp manages to keep his secret: the relationship suffers. Philipp has meetings with his mother and during one of these meetings his mother tells him she is sure Tanya is pregnant: she has all the symptoms of morning sickness and 'a woman can tell'. Philipp, though mortified, declares he will remain with Tanya, and at a party when the couple encounters Matthias (Philipp and Matthias greet each other with passion), Philipp introduces Tanya as his wife. Matthias is shocked and hurt and flees, and outraged Tanya discards Philipp. Philipp roams the streets and parks looking for Matthias, realizing they can now be lovers, but doesn't find him. He instead encounters one of his high school students Lutz (Robert Hummel) and has a one-night stand. In a sleazy gay bar Philipp meets an old man (brilliant actor Werner Dissel) who relates how life as a gay man during Hitler's reign had resulted in incarceration in a concentration camp, that gay men will always be persecuted. Returning to his classroom Philipp is informed that he is under observation because of his sexual activity. Struck by silence, Philipp stands before his class, his future unknown.
This story by Wolfram Witt as directed by Heiner Carow is as fine as any relating the terrors of coming out. That it is performed by such a fine cast is even more impressive, and the real banner that flies over this film is that it doesn't attempt to provide answers or maudlin endings. It merely stops - leaving the futures of each of these well-drawn characters to the imagination of the audience. It is powerful, it is well made, it is worthy of continued appreciation as a brave little film from another period in time, a period that continues into the present in so many places. Highly recommended. Grady Harp, December 05
Movie Review: Just any city
Summary: 4 Stars
This story takes place behind the Berlin Wall, but it really could be taking place in any city. There's nothing that screams COMMUNIST at you. The lead character is a young, good-looking, and well-built young man who is a school teacher. His students are easily in thrall to him, and you don't blame them. He seems passionate about his subject. It is interesting as what plays out in real life for him - his being torn between his girlfriend and a young man he is instantly attracted to - is played out in his classroom, as both a young woman and a young man are both obviously devoted to him. His interest in them is strictly professional, however, and despite his confusion of a heterosexual lifestyle or a homosexual one - and he believes he must choose, he cannot have it both ways. This in spite of his sexually functioning with both sexes. The mid-section of the film is about his being faced with this conundrum and the final part is about his decision and its consequences. A very good lead actor and actress, and though the sexual nature of this young man is the pivotable point of the story, I wished for more interraction between him and his students, as he seemed the type of teacher we all fantasize we wish we had when we were in school. There are many scenes of rear nudity as the young teacher is casual of dress at home, and especially with his adoring girlfriend who obviously thinks of her handsome lover as a trophy she can't believe she's won.Movie Review: Comming Out; a tragic yet haunting love story
Summary: 4 Stars
Philipp (Matthias Freihol) is a High school literary teacher in East Berlin who falls in love with I assume another teacher who he accidently runs into and gives a bloody nose to. They start a relationship and move into together; one night Philipp visits a gay bay and meet Matthias (Dirk Kummer) a 19 year old (both actors are good looking too)at a Berlin gay bar; Philipp gets wasted and is carried home to Phillip's other apartment in lived in before he started the relationship with his girfriend by Matthias, who spend the night; Philipp is so drunk is remembers little of the affair and runs into Matthias again while waiting to purchase tickets for a show. They reminise about the night before and get reaquainted; all of this behind his girlfriends back.The rest of the movie finds Philipp torn between his girlfriend and Matthias; tring to have his cake and eat it to (no pun intended) until all three meet at another event and Philipps finds his life falling apart at all ends; his mother finds out he's gay the girlfriend-wife spurns him and matthias is divestated by Philipps double life.
There is no happy ending here and I have found that foreign films are more true to life more indepth and multipli-dimensional than there U.S. counterparts.
This is a dark and sad film which I believe many of us gay people can relate to at least so aspect of it.
Movie Review: Thoughtful, penetrating view of gay life in Berlin
Summary: 4 Stars
Advertised as the first significant gay drama to come out of Berlin, the film premiered to wide acclaim on the same night of the falling of the Berlin Wall. It is a surprisingly well done story of a closeted school teacher who becomes romantically involved with a female co-worker but then suppressed desires from his past begin to resurface when he meets a young man (Matthias) in a concert ticket line. He visits an underground gay bar and eventually becomes involved with Matthias but is torn by his true feelings and how his society will view him.The film has a haunting quality yet remains starkly realistic (the opening scene which depicts Matthias having his stomach pumped after a suicide attempt is quite graphic and disturbing). Most of the scenes are filmed on location in Berlin's gay bars, subways, streets, classrooms and houses. The sex scenes are not explicit yet very erotic and very well done. Overall, the film boasts excellent production values and performances and the dvd picture is sharp and colors are good. The scenes in Berlin's gay bars are particularly fascinating (apparently drag queens are really popular there.)