DEFA is celebrating its 80th anniversary this year. Since 1946, the East German state film studio has been a place where propaganda was produced and control and censorship were the order of the day—yet at the same time, it was home to great artists who repeatedly fought to carve out creative freedom. We’re celebrating the legacy of these directors where it belongs: at the newly renovated Kino International on Karl-Marx-Allee, the former DEFA premiere theater—now featuring Christie laser projection, 4K, and Dolby 7.1. 

‎‎

Over eight Sundays, we’ll be screening outstanding works that have lost none of their power to this day—in the original German version with English subtitles.

‎‎

Berlin, 1945. A concentration camp survivor returns to her old apartment in a completely devastated Berlin. There she finds a doctor who is trying to escape his war memories by drinking. Wolfgang Staudte’s film THE MURDERERS ARE AMONG US was the first film produced by DEFA after the war, shot directly amid the city’s ruins.