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Angels of Iron
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Wikipedia article
'Angels of Iron' is a 1981 German crime film directed by Thomas Brasch. It was entered into the 1981 Cannes Film Festival, but did not win at Cannes. Director Thomas Brasch won the Bavarian Film Award for Best Direction.
Plot
The black-and-white film dramatizes the true story of a Berlin gang of thieves led by juvenile Werner Gladow during the time of the Berlin Blockade and Airlift. Likening Occupied Germany to the Prohibition era United States, writer-director Brasch paints a sympathetic portrait of organized crime in Germany facilitated by demoralization, lawlessness, and anarchy until the 1949 foundation of East and West Germany brings the old "forces of order" (as they are called by Gladow's partner in crime, Gustav Vlpel, who used to hang Nazi war criminals for the Allied occupation forces) back to the forefront as former Nazis regain their pre-1945 positions in both German states.
When eventually these "forces of order" come back to power at the end of the Berlin Blockade, they crack down on the anarchic Gladow Gang. Gladow himself is sentenced to death for murder and executed by East Germany at the age of 18 in 1950. Although ex-Nazis offer Vlpel a job in the new West-German police if he'll flee to West Berlin, he prefers to stay in an East-German prison until he dies in 1959. This is because Vlpel feels freer in prison than inside any ordered society, just as he did before when the Nazis incarcerated him for refusing to fight for them during the Second World War.
Cast
* Hilmar Thate as Gustav Vlpel
* Katharina Thalbach as Lisa Gabler
* Ulrich Wesselmann as Gladow
* Karin Baal as Frau Luzie Gladow
* Ilse Pag as Frau Gerti Vlpel
* Peter Brombacher as Schfer
* Klaus Pohl as Gabler
* Hanns Zischler as Ridzinski (credited as Hans Zischler)
* Horst Laube as Gladow's father
* Jrgen Flimm as West-German police commissioner
* Kurt Raab as driver
* Michael Danisch
* Karl-Heinz Grewe (credited as Karl Heinz Grewe)
* Urs Hefti
* Hermann Killmeyer
Awards
The film ran in the First Feature Competition at the 1981 Cannes Film Festival, but was unsuccessful.'Bertolucci ist der Favorit', in Pforzheimer Zeitung vom 8. Mai 1981, S. 13 The film was also a contribution to the Max Ophls Film Prize in 1982.'Filme aus vier Lndern im Wettbewerb', in Pforzheimer Zeitung vom 11. Dezember 1981, S. 7
Ilse Pag received the Gold German Film Award in 1981 for her portrayal of his wife Vlpel.
Director Thomas Brasch was awarded the 1981 Bavarian Film Awards, which is worth more than DM 50,000 for his debut directorship.'Buh-Rufe fr DDR-Regisseur', in Pforzheimer Zeitung vom 19. Januar 1982, S. 10
References
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