Dreißig Jahre an der Peitsche

Dreißig Jahre an der Peitsche 2024

1

A portrait of Rosa von Praunheim's neighbor, who worked for decades as a professional dominatrix in Berlin's Wilmersdorf district. While the real Lady MacLaine reflects authentically and wittily on her life and work, her life is retold in dramatized scenes.

2024

Die Bettwurst

Die Bettwurst 1971

5.30

It is love at first sight: elderly secretary Luzi and young, unemployed Dietmar find each other by accident in Rosa von Praunheim’s outrageous genre, social satire.

1971

The Einstein of Sex: Life and Work of Dr. M. Hirschfeld

The Einstein of Sex: Life and Work of Dr. M. Hirschfeld 2000

5.60

The life story of Dr. Magnus Hirschfeld, a German Jew, who as a physician established the field of sexology, and fought militantly against German anti-sodomy laws in the late 19th century. The script reveals main characters in Hirschfeld's life including impossible love interest Baron von Teschenberg, and Hirschfeld's aids- young Karl Giese and guardian angel, the transvestite Dorchen, as they establish the First Institute of Sexual Sciences in Berlin in 1920, and follows their struggles to keep it open, up to the rise of the Third Reich in the mid 1930s.

2000

Darkroom

Darkroom 2019

5.78

Lars, a male nurse from Saarbrücken, moves to Berlin with his lover, Roland. They begin to renovate an apartment and their happiness seems almost complete. What Roland doesn’t know is that, while secretly checking out Berlin’s night life, Lars is also experimenting with a deadly poison.

2019

Anita – Dances of Vice

Anita – Dances of Vice 1988

5.10

In modern-day Berlin (1987), Frau Kutowski goes insane, believing herself to be the (real-life) notorious Anita Berber, a nude art dancer/drug addict/scandalous figure of post-WWI Berlin. (Berber died of tuberculosis in 1928, having achieved significant success and recognition throughout the dance world.) Frau Kutowski is placed in a mental hospital, where in her own mind she acts out Berber's final days, including in her fantasies the hospital's staff and patients, to represent Anita's friends and associates.

1988

Rex Gildo: The Last Dance

Rex Gildo: The Last Dance 2022

4.90

Rex Gildo’s songs and musicals made him very popular. His best-known song was “Fiesta Mexicana” from 1972. Rosa von Praunheim tells the story of his life in the context of the gay pride movement, the normative pressures of the Schlager music industry, and the profound changes currently underway.

2022

Friendship of Men

Friendship of Men 2018

5.50

In this docudrama Rosa von Praunheim looks into Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s sexual orientation, especially into his erotic experiences during his travels in Italy. Contrary to the common belief, von Praunheim argues that Goethe was not a heartbreaker and conqueror after all. It was only in Italy, that he had diverse sexual experiences, not least with men. Von Praunheim bases his assumption on letters written by Goethe to his friend Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi about these sexual encounters. Some of the content of these letters is re-encated in the film. At the same time, historians and linguists analyse and classify the letters into their historical context.

2018

I Am My Own Woman

I Am My Own Woman 1992

4.30

The life story of Charlotte von Mahlsdorf, who survived the Nazi reign as a trans woman and helped start the German gay liberation movement. Documentary with some dramatized scenes. Two actors play the young and middle aged Charlotte and she plays herself in the later years.

1992

Who is Helene Schwarz?

Who is Helene Schwarz? 2005

1

Only the chosen few know this woman who started working as a secretary for the German Film and Television Academy (DFFB) on 13 February, 1966. The path of Helen’s career is paved with famous names – including that of Wolfgang Petersen, Holger Meins (who later became a member of the Red Army Faction) as well as directors Wolfgang Becker, Detlev Buck and Christian Petzold. All have fond memories of forgetting their troubles after having poured their hearts out over a cup of coffee in Helene’s office – for Helene was both friend and advisor to countless film students.

2005

Die Nachtigall – Der grausame Sohn

Die Nachtigall – Der grausame Sohn 2021

1

Rosa von Praunheim was inspired to make this film by his own radio play “Die Nachtigall” (The Nightingale) from 1986, when he improvised together with street singer Friedrich Steinhauer, who called himself “die Nachtigall vom Ramersdorf” (The Nightingale of Ramersdorf), and Luzi Kryn, who became famous for her role in Praunheim’s film DIE BETTWURST. Now, more than 30 years later, Rosa von Praunheim has filmed his material with singer and actor Hubert Wild and an eccentric former teacher, Ellen Reichardt, who has appeared in several of his films already.

2021

Positive

Positive 1990

4.00

This film powerfully documents New York City's gay community's response to the AIDS crisis as they are forced to organize themselves after the government's failure to stem the epidemic. Activists who are interviewed include playwrite Larry Kramer, People With AIDS Coalition co-founder Michael Callen (who died of AIDS in 1994), New York filmmaker and journalist Phil Zwickler, as well as representatives from ACT-UP, Queer Nation and the Gay Men's Health Crisis.

1990

Horror Vacui

Horror Vacui 1984

5.00

Shot in a neo-expressionist style, the film is a satire on cults of any kind. The plot follows Frankie and Hannes, a young gay couple living in Berlin. One is studying art and the other medicine. Their happy life is disrupted when Frankie attends a lecture and quickly becomes involved in a sinister cult operating as a self-help group called “Optimal Optimism”. Madame C, a former Nazi party member, is the leader of Optimal Optimism. When the cult members discovers that Frankie is gay, he is repeatedly raped by both men and women of the group. Hannes must find a way to rescue him.

1984

Rosas Welt – 70 neue Filme von Rosa von Praunheim

Rosas Welt – 70 neue Filme von Rosa von Praunheim 2012

1

Rosa von Praunheim is an icon in the scene: gay activist, loving provocateur and a very special filmmaker from Berlin for decades. His curiosity for people and their fates runs through his extensive film work. For his 70th birthday he has now made 70 new short films. In the first part of the big project, he confronts Thilo Sarrazin with the mayor of Neukölln, Heinz Buschkowsky, and the Turkish lawyer and women's rights activist Seyran Ates; shows a homosexual hustler in Bucharest; gossip reporter Andreas Kurtz, who knows everything about Berlin's celebrities; Rosa's neighbors who live with her dependent brother; Esther Bauer, who survived Auschwitz, and the Berlin comedian Ades Zabel. High on the roofs of Berlin, the gay chimney sweep Alain Rappsilber tells him about his fetish leather meeting Folsom.

2012

Men, Heroes and Gay Nazis

Men, Heroes and Gay Nazis 2005

6.30

The film focuses on gay men who align themselves with hard-core right wing views, skinheads and Nazis. Rosa von Praunheim stated of the subjects featured in the documentary, “Some may be shocked that I do not take a stand in my film and do not portray gay neo-Nazis as monsters, but as people living their lives in dramatic contradiction.”

2005

Auf der Suche nach Heilern

Auf der Suche nach Heilern 2014

1

“I am a hypochondriac”, admits Rosa Von Praunheim, the icon of the gay movement, right at the beginning at the film. The director, who turned seventy in 2012, is afraid of cancer, and he actually suffers from glaucoma, with osteoarthritis in his big toe. Von Praunheim is interested in alternative medicine and goes on a foray into the scene.

2014

Queens Don’t Cry

Queens Don’t Cry 2002

4.00

Bosom buddies BeV StroganoV, Ovo Maltine, Ichgola Androgyn and Tima die Göttliche are four Berlin drag queens who met in the mid 1980s. These four queens became Germany’s most popular drag performers and have been busy fertilizing the German cultural scene. Besides being performers, they are also political activists – in AIDS awareness, anti-gay violence, the sex workers movement and the struggle against the extreme right and racism. The film tells their story.

2002

Six Dead Students

Six Dead Students 2007

1

Rosa von Praunheim, the director of the film, parodies himself and his time as a professor at the Film School in Potsdam Babelsberg, where he taught for six years.

2007

Silence = Death

Silence = Death 1990

5.60

AIDS victims and activists cope with hardship and society’s ignorance.

1990