Marita Breuer

Young nurse Sissi lives a secluded life, seemingly entirely devoted to her patients at Birkenhof asylum. Her first encounter with ex-soldier and drifter Bodo has a lasting impact. He causes an accident that results in her lying under a truck, unable to breathe. While he provides life-saving first aid, mesmerized Sissi begins to wonder whether he may be the man of her dreams. But when she tracks him down weeks later her affection is rejected, as Bodo is stuck somewhere between a traumatic past and a criminal future. (imdb)

Celebrated West German director Alexander Kluge presents this drama that strings together vignettes of events taken from everyday newspaper headlines. Germans are shown in their reactions to World War II, minorities, and the elderly. A side plot follows a meeting between former West German Chancellor Helmut Schmidt and East German leader Erich Honecker. (answers.com)

Set in the mid-19th century, this latest instalment in the decades-spanning Heimat series from venerable German filmmaker Edgar Reitz chronicles the quests of two Hunsrück families to escape poverty and famine by forging a new life in Brazil. (tiff.net)

Lulu, the daughter of musician Hermann Simon, is looking for something she feels is missing from her life. She delves into the past and is transported to the lives of her ancestors via dreamlike sequences that show the hopes and realities of her female relations over the course of an entire century. (imdb)