German filmmaker Rosa von Praunheim had a very personal and moving film in this year's festival. His documentary film, Two Mothers, told the story of von Praunheim's search for his biological mother, the woman who had given birth to him in a prison during the height of World War II. Here is my review of the film. Be sure to scroll down and read about the roundtable interview with von Praunheim.

Rosa von Praunheim’s
Two Mothers
2008 Tribeca Film Festival
April 23 - May 4, 2008

Reviewed by Wendy R. Williams

German filmmaker Rosa von Praunheim had one hell-of-a-mid-life-crisis. Born during World War II, von Praunheim had grown up in post war West Germany and became a film maker and film teacher. And then when he was fifty-eight, his mother told him something that tilted his world and made him question everything about who he was and where he came from.

Here is a quote from the press releases: “Raised as Holger Mischwitzky before he adopted his stage name, Rosa von Praunheim, the prominent German filmmaker turns the camera on himself in this documentary about the search for his birth parents. At the age of ninety-five, von Praunheim's beloved mother, Gertrud, revealed that she had adopted him from a children's home in Riga, Latvia. After her death, with only that snippet of information to go on, von Praunheim and a team of dedicated researchers seek out what information they can about his origins. Von Praunheim must enlist the aid of scholars and historians in Germany and Latvia to narrow down the possibilities-is he Jewish? Illegitimate? A product of Aryan science.”

The documentary tells the story of von Praunheim’s search for his birth mother but in the search, Praunheim also examines the Germany of his parent’s generation when most good Germans were Nazi party sympathizers and where in a place like Riga “26,000 people could be exterminated in two days, as the Jews in Latvia were in 1941.” And von Praunheim has help in his search; he is assisted by his able film students and also by many of his friends who are historians.

In looking for his past, von Praunheim examines Germany’s past and asks many uncomfortable questions. And he is successful. He finds out who his mother was and where he was born. But there the search ends. When von Praunheim looks into the abyss and sees the possibilities of who may have actually fathered him, he wisely chose to stop his search.

Two Mothers tells a universal story about the desire we all have to know where we came from. And it also tells a painful story of an entire generation in Germany who would prefer to not look at their past. But the story resonates everywhere for anyone who has decided to “shine a flashlight” on their past. Maybe we have not found Nazis, but everyone who has done so has most certainly found humans.

The Intereview with Rosa Von Braunheim

Question about whether there had been any reaction to the film from the press:

Rosa von Praunheim: We had our first Q & A audience yesterday. Many people said they became very emotional, very moved. One of my students said it was the first time he ever saw me as sympathetic.

Question about whether it would have been different if he had undertaken this journey when he was in his twenties.

Rosa von Praunheim: Well, I was a radical revolutionary when I was in my twenties. But I could not have done the research then because of the Iron Curtain. I would not have been able to research the records in Latvia.

This is something that is better done at the end of my life.

[One of the journalist’s present noted that his biological aunt had lived until a ripe old age.]

Rosa von Praunheim: Women always live longer than men.

My adoptive mother told me about my adoption before she died but after she died, I became more interested [in finding his biological mother]. But after my [journey], I now know where my provocation came from. I ask myself, “Why am I always on my own? Why do I feel that I have to out famous people in Germany?” [Von Praunheim told us that he is gay and had changed his name to Rosa Von Praunheim (from Holger Mischwitzky) as an act of solidarity with the gay movement.]

Question about what he (von Praunheim) thought about the film? What did you gain from making this journey?

Rosa von Praunheim: The value is in experiencing the collective story. It was very moving to see what the holocaust did in terms of the political and personal stories. There are sons and grandsons who never wanted to talk to their grandparents about what happened. My students did not want to know what their grandparents did.

[One of the journalists present at the roundtable, Ingrid Scheib Rothbart, then spoke.]

Ingrid Scheib Rothbart: There was such a difference in how the story of the Holocaust was handled in East and West Germany. In the West, the American army forced everyone to watch film clips of the liberation of the camps. In the East, the former Nazis became East German potentates [in the Communist regime]. The story was told much differently in East and West Germany.

Question about when he (von Praunheim) realized that his adoptive parents were Nazis?

Rosa von Praunheim: My father hated Marlene Dietrich. He regarded her as a traitor. But as a young gay man, I naturally idolized Marlene Dietrich. Before the Nazis came into power, my adoptive parents had been so poor they could not afford to marry. They had no money. After the Nazis came into power, my father had a good job and could afford to marry. My father hated gays, Jews and left- wing people. But my father, despite his prejudices, was a kind man. He was raised Roman Catholic and was always loving to me.

Von Praunheim then ended the interview with this quote about his career as a documentary filmmaker: “I document so history never dies.”

Additional information and further details on the Tribeca Film Festival can be found at www.tribecafilmfestival.org.