Nina Kern, a divorced woman in her late twenties, will soon be fully deprived of her custody rights for her three children, who already reside in a home for the displaced due to Nina’s many years of willful neglect. Although she has broken her promise to change her moral conduct many times, she is given one last chance on probation.
Acting
Katrin Sass makes self-destruction devastatingly watchable.
Direction
Zschoche's unflinching gaze, no moral hand-holding.
Director
Herrmann Zschoche
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
DEFA films like this exposed 'socialist reality' cracks the GDR preferred hidden; Sass became East Germany's biggest star partly through such raw roles.
Zschoche originally shot alternate endings—some with Nina succeeding, others failing—suggesting even he wrestled with whether she deserved empathy.
DE
