“You have no chance, but use it!” That’s roughly how the power structures in East-Berlin in December 1989 could be described. On one side the apparatus of the state, which desperately clung to power. On the other side a heap of fragmented opposition groups, from the Neues Forum to Demokratischer Aufbruch – estimates assume there were 600 activists at the time – and a population who were only just beginning to see themselves as a people. Representatives of both sides faced each other at the Round Table. Previously unpublished material in this film shows how they struggled for every inch of power, every word. After all, the subject matter was nothing less than basic political legitimization, the state’s power monopoly and the National Security Agency. To create a chance for a “third way”, as the opposition groups hoped, they would have had to implement their own constitution. Three former member of the opposition groups reflect on this four month power vacuum as a period of time when utopia was within their grasp.
Marc Bauder was born in 1974 in Stuttgart, lives in Berlin. Studied Business Administration in Cologne, St. Gallen, New York and film directing at the Film School Potsdam-Babelsberg. In 1997-1999 was Media Consultant for HMR International. In 1999 founded Bauderfilm.
Doerte Franke was born in 1974 in Leipzig, lives in Berlin since 2001. Studied political science at the University of Cologne and film at the Film School Potsdam-Babelsberg. Dorte writes books, essays and articles for various newspapers and magazines.
No Lost Time (2000), Grow or Go – the Architects of the Global Village (2003), The Communist (2006), Last to Know (2006), Stumbling Block (2007), The Top-Manager (2007), After the Revolution (2010), The System (2011)
