A 17-minute revolution that'll make you question who history serves.
This documentary shows the German Peasants’ War between 1524 and 1525 and looks at the role of Thomas Müntzer in it. Müntzer, who was a follower and admirer of Martin Luther, directed his resistance not only against the clerical authorities ruled by the papacy, but also against the secular worldly order. In Mühlhausen, Müntzer worked as a pastor in the Marienkirche and later became an agitator and promoter of the violent liberation of the peasants. Luther distanced himself from Müntzer at the beginning of the Peasant Wars. In the battle of Frankenhausen the rebels were completely defeated, Müntzer captured, tortured and publicly executed on May 27, 1525.
Direction
Bartsch weaponizes archival footage like a guillotine.
Writing
Narration that treats peasants as protagonists, not victims.
Director
Wolfgang Bartsch
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
DEFA documentaries like this served East Germany's anti-fascist narrative by framing 1525 as Germany's first socialist uprising.
Bartsch made this during Honecker's thaw; Müntzer's 'excesses' were officially debatable again after decades of Stalinist silence.
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