As a history student I was very interested about the legend of Liebknecht and Luxemburg. Searching for movies about the German revolution and the Spartacists I stumbled upon this one. With not too much expectation I took a beer and started the movie. I must say that I was quite surprised by the fact that the movie really started in the middle of the story. Socialists from SPD and USPD are on the eve of the revolution and are discussing the revolution to come. I was very lucky that I at least knew something about the subject because otherwise it would almost have been unbearable to even follow the plot line. No character is introduced and the viewer is supposed to know who everybody is and what is political point of view is. The revolution starting in Kiel (the start of the revolution) is mentioned during the socialist meeting in one of the first scene. But we only see the sailors once they have already reached Berlin. Then we suddenly see the emperor. Then we suddenly see the family of Liebknecht. Then we suddenly see a normal family which sometimes returns throughout the story. We also see the discussion starting between Ebert and Scheidemann on one side and Pieck and Liebknecht on the other side. And then there is a soldier on his way to deliver a newspaper to Moscow...
I was barely following the storyline anymore. The story is actually extremely thin, the arguments are very simple, but because of the sudden switches of scenes that seem to have no relationship with each other, everything ends up in a big question mark
And that was actually the point when I started to realize that it was not so much a historical movie about the real life of Liebknecht.
The movie is actually quite a cheap propagandistic effort of the Eastern German Government to defend the existence of the DDR. Liebknecht is being displayed as the Saviour of the German people about 30 years before the communistic ideals were accomplished.
At a certain point I realized that the propaganda was dripping from my screen. Suddenly we see Lenin praising Luxembourg and Liebknecht, even though it is not really clear what he is doing in the movie (except for praising the main characters).
By the end of the movie the social democrats, with Ebert and Noske in the lead, have turned into monsters making it so unbelievable that it actually turned out to be funny and laughable.
My advise: Don't watch it unless you are interested in the history of Eastern German Propaganda.
I was barely following the storyline anymore. The story is actually extremely thin, the arguments are very simple, but because of the sudden switches of scenes that seem to have no relationship with each other, everything ends up in a big question mark
And that was actually the point when I started to realize that it was not so much a historical movie about the real life of Liebknecht.
The movie is actually quite a cheap propagandistic effort of the Eastern German Government to defend the existence of the DDR. Liebknecht is being displayed as the Saviour of the German people about 30 years before the communistic ideals were accomplished.
At a certain point I realized that the propaganda was dripping from my screen. Suddenly we see Lenin praising Luxembourg and Liebknecht, even though it is not really clear what he is doing in the movie (except for praising the main characters).
By the end of the movie the social democrats, with Ebert and Noske in the lead, have turned into monsters making it so unbelievable that it actually turned out to be funny and laughable.
My advise: Don't watch it unless you are interested in the history of Eastern German Propaganda.