ACCORDING TO ITS CONTEMPORARY RECEPTION in magazines and newspapers of the newly reunited Germany of 1992, Helmut Dziuba’s final DEFA directorial endeavor, Jana und Jan, met with mixed reviews. Some of the more insightful and poignant articles from the period can be found in two established GDR newspapers based in Berlin. Junge Welt and Neue Zeit offer two disparate perspectives of this Wende youth film.

René Römer interviews the director for Junge Welt in “Nahe der Katastrophe liegt immer die Chance,” published on May 27, 1992. The piece reveals the intriguing context of the film’s production, including the hardship and uncertainty experienced by the director as well as the crew. In addition, the article divulges the provocative historical and political motivations behind not only the story but also the film’s historically charged mise-en-scène.

On the other hand, the second article, Michael Hanisch’s “Die Wehen beginnen am Todesstreifen,” which appeared in Neue Zeit on June 3, 1992, urges the viewer to consider Jana und Jan more critically vis-à-vis its representational function. Hanisch praises the film for engaging with the weighty topic of life in a youth rehabilitation home in the GDR; however, he also admonishes the film’s turn, especially toward the second half, to cliché and heavy-handed symbolism. While the article does not elaborate on how Dziuba uses this symbolism, or to what end, the author’s emphasis on these representational and aesthetic questions foregrounds the importance of the film as an artwork as well as a political and historical document.

René Römer

Next to Catastrophe There Is Always Opportunity

First published as “Nahe in der Katastrophe liegt immer die Chance” in Junge Welt (May 27, 1992).

Translated by Olivia Landry.

The name Helmut Dziuba is synonymous with DEFA’s children’s and youth films. His new film “Jana und Jan,” a poetic as much as tense love story in a juvenile rehabilitation home, opens in German cinemas in the next few days.

Film students have just installed his computer. Right now, he is recounting how Peter Sodann called him (fishing for information about a new film, although the “old one” is only just starting to play in theaters). Just now, he is considering if it is worthwhile to have a fax machine.