Release Date | 2003-09-18 |
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Runtime | 136 minutes |
Genres | Drama, War |
Stars | Katja Riemann, Maria Schrader, Doris Schade, Jutta Lampe, Svea Lohde |
Directors | Pamela Katz, Margarethe von Trotta, Margarethe von Trotta, Henrik Meyer, Richard Schöps |
When Ruth's husband dies in New York, in 2000, she imposes strict Jewish mourning, which puzzles her children. A stranger comes to the house - Ruth's cousin - with a picture of Ruth, age 8, in Berlin, with a woman the cousin says helped Ruth escape. Hannah, Ruth's daughter engaged to a gentile, goes to Berlin to find the woman, Lena Fisher, now 90. Posing as a journalist investigating intermarriage, Hannah interviews Lena who tells the story of a week in 1943 when the Jewish husbands of Aryan women were detained in a building on Rosenstrasse. The women gather daily for word of their husbands. The film goes back and forth to tell Ruth and Lena's story. How will it affect Hannah?