The Silent Revolution

In East Germany in 1956 a high school class holds two minutes of silence in a lesson for those killed in the Hungarian uprising. The teacher reports it, and within days the matter climbs from the school to the ministry. The state wants one thing: the name of the ringleader. None of the twenty students gives it, and in return all of them are barred from university. Lars Kraume adapted a real event, the story of a class in Storkow. The film does not construct heroism; most of the children are frightened, the families come apart and some come close to betrayal. Its best section is the fathers being forced to reckon with their own pasts. It played in Berlin. Who it is for: viewers who like East German history and stories of pressure inside a school. Who it is not for: anyone expecting a fast narrative.