''Star-Crossed Lovers'' (, ''King's Children''; also known as ''Invincible Love'') is a 1962 East German romantic

war drama In film and television show, television, drama is a category or genre of narrative fiction (or docudrama, semi-fiction) intended to be more serious than humour, humorous in tone. The drama of this kind is usually qualified with additional te ...

film directed by

Frank Beyer Frank Paul Beyer (; 26 May 1932 – 1 October 2006) was a German film director. In East Germany he was one of the most important film directors, working for the state film monopoly DEFA (film studio), DEFA and directed films that dealt mostl ...

Plot

Magdalena and Michael are two children from working-class families in Berlin, who have sworn to marry each other. When they grow older, after the

Nazis Nazism (), formally named National Socialism (NS; , ), is the far-right politics, far-right Totalitarianism, totalitarian socio-political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Germany. During H ...

rose to power, Michael is arrested for being a member of the Communist Party. Magdalena joins the underground party to continue his work. Jürgen, a friend of the two who is now a storm trooper (Sturmabteilung)

paramilitary A paramilitary is a military that is not a part of a country's official or legitimate armed forces. The Oxford English Dictionary traces the use of the term "paramilitary" as far back as 1934. Overview Though a paramilitary is, by definiti ...

wing of the

Nazi Party The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party ( or NSDAP), was a far-right politics, far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that created and supported the ideology of Nazism. Its precursor ...

, tries to convince her not to become a communist. During the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, Michael is sent to a

penal battalion A penal military unit, also known as a penal formation, disciplinary unit, or just penal unit (usually named for their formation and size, such as ''penal battalion'' for battalions, ''penal regiment'' for regiments, ''penal company'' for companie ...

on the Eastern Front, where he meets Jürgen again as a commanding officer. Michael overpowers him, defects to the

Red Army The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army, often shortened to the Red Army, was the army and air force of the Russian Soviet Republic and, from 1922, the Soviet Union. The army was established in January 1918 by a decree of the Council of People ...

and returns to the battalion once more to convince the soldiers to surrender, thus saving their lives. He reaches Moscow, where he sees Magdalena board a plane. He tries to call out to her, but she does not hear him. They will never meet again.

Cast

* Annekathrin Bürger as Magdalena *

Armin Mueller-Stahl Armin Mueller-Stahl (born 17 December 1930) is a retired German actor who also appeared in numerous English-language films since the 1980s. He was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his role in ''Shine (1996 film), Sh ...

as Michael *

Ulrich Thein Ulrich Thein (7 April 1930 – 21 June 1995) was a German actor, film director and screenwriter. He appeared in more than 40 films and television shows between 1953 and 1995. He won the award for Best Actor at the 11th Moscow International F ...

as Jürgen *

Manfred Krug Manfred Krug (; 8 February 1937 – 21 October 2016) was a German actor, singer and author. Life and work Born in Duisburg, Krug moved to East Germany at the age of 13, and worked at a steel plant before beginning his acting career on the stage ...

as captain * Marga Legal as Mrs. Seifert *Betty Loewen as Hanna Bartels *Monika Lennartz as Katya *Gertraud Kreissig as Ursula *Natalia Illina as Vera *Talla Novikova as pilot *Leonid Svetlov as Sasha *Nikolai Lukinov as Red Army Major *Walter Lendrich as Schröter *Günter Naumann as Herbert *

Fred Delmare Werner Vorndran (24 April 1922 – 1 May 2009), known professionally as Fred Delmare, was a German actor. Life and work Werner Vorndran was the son of a carpenter and a seamstress and grew up in Hüttensteinach at Sonneberg in Thuringia, wh ...

as Albert *Erik Veldre as Hans

Production

The work on ''Star-Crossed Lovers'' began even before the principal photography of Beyer's previous pictures, ''

Five Cartridges ''Five Cartridges'' () is a 1960 East German film directed by Frank Beyer and starring Erwin Geschonneck, Armin Mueller-Stahl and Manfred Krug. Plot During the Spanish Civil War, a battalion of the International Brigades is cut off without water ...

'', was completed. Most of the crew of ''Five Cartridges'', mainly writers Edith and Walter Gorrish, collaborated again to create the new picture, as well as actor

. The producers employed the technique of a story board, which was pioneered by Beyer in his last film. He also used several

expressionist Expressionism is a modernist movement, initially in poetry and painting, originating in Northern Europe around the beginning of the 20th century. Its typical trait is to present the world solely from a subjective perspective, distorting it rad ...

motifs during the shooting, to recreate the atmosphere of Germany in the 1930s.Miera Liehm, Antonin J. Liehm. ''The Most Important Art: Soviet and Eastern European Film After 1945''. . p. 265.

Reception

''Star-Crossed Lovers'' won Frank Beyer a special Medal of Honor in the 13th

Karlovy Vary International Film Festival The Karlovy Vary International Film Festival (, KVIFF) is an annual film festival held in Karlovy Vary, Czech Republic. The Karlovy Vary Festival is one of the oldest in the world and has become Central and Eastern Europe, Central and Eastern Eur ...

. Daniela Berghahn considered the picture as a "prominent example" to the DEFA films that "transgressed the aesthetic boundaries of

Social Realism Social realism is work produced by painters, printmakers, photographers, writers, filmmakers and some musicians that aims to draw attention to the real socio-political conditions of the working class as a means to critique the power structures ...

." Axel Geiss wrote that the film was a representative of "DEFA's most important tradition: the dealing with the Nazi past." Paul Cooke and Marc Silberman commented that the antifascist cause was shown by the picture to be ultimately more important than the romantic ideals. At 1985, the film was withdrawn from circulation by the DEFA Commission, after Armin Mueller-Stahl and other members of the crew emigrated to West Germany.Copy of the Commission's protocol on filmportal.de.
/ref>

References

External links

*
''Star-Crossed Lovers''
at filmportal.de/en *
Star-Crossed Lovers
' on cinema.de {{DEFAULTSORT:Star Crossed Lovers 1962 films East German films Films directed by Frank Beyer 1960s German-language films Films set in Berlin Eastern Front of World War II films German war drama films German romantic drama films Films set in the 1930s Films set in the 1940s 1960s war drama films 1962 romantic drama films 1962 drama films 1960s German films Films scored by Joachim Werzlau