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Hot Summer
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| Year: |
1968
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Director: |
Joachim Hasler
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| Stars: |
Frank Schöbel, Chris Doerk, Regine Albrecht, Hanns-Michael Schmidt, Madeleine Lierck, Urta Bühler, Camilla Hempel, Leonore Kaufman, Ursula Soika, Hella Zeising, Sylvia von Kashiwoslozki, Marlis Räth, Angelika Schmidt, Norbert Speer, Hans Mietzner
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| Genre: |
Musical, Comedy, Drama |
| Rating: |
  6 (from 1 vote) |
| Review: |
It is the height of summer in Eastern Europe and two groups of friends, eleven girls and ten boys, are making plans to leave the big city in East Germany and holiday by the Baltic Sea. However, first they have to reach it, and the easiest way seems to be hitchhiking, which gives rise to a rivalry between the girls and the boys as to who will get there first. The ladies have the advantage due to being easier on the eye to those willing to offer lifts, and zoom off leaving the men exasperated in the dust, but they are picked up eventually and off they go. Along the way, the two groups encounter each other, with the girls cheating the boys out of a lift after they help out a lorry driver, and the girls fooled into taking a short cut across a damp and mosquito-ridden meadow. Once at the farm where they will be staying, the hijinks continue, but there's trouble on the horizon...
It seemed strange for Western audiences that behind the Iron Curtain anyone could be making jolly musicals, as the vision of life there was envisaged to be food shortages, everyone driving one make of car that continually broke down, knocks on the door at three o'clock in the morning, and a general air of grey, concrete gloom. So watching Hot Summer, or Heißer Sommer to give the film its original title, may be a surprise, with its fun-loving young people dancing and singing to their hearts' content as if there was no totalitarian regime hanging over their heads. That said, events do take a darker turn after the first half of relentless lightheartedness, with one character upsetting the status quo of the community - especially as the message is that we're all in this together.
But those musical numbers are a sight to see, with most of them featuring somewhat, erm, limited routines most of which even I could manage, although a spot of tumbling enters the frame later on. Two of the stars, Frank Schöbel and Chris Doerk, were pop singers of the day, and just as their Western counterparts appeared in their own movies so did they although oddly they don't play boyfriend and girlfriend as you might have expected. Despite the unimpressive Terpsichorean delights to behold, the tunes they all belt out are pretty catchy, and indeed the soundtrack album was a big hit in its native land. There are elements that would not have made it into a Hollywood musical, such as dancing with sheep and dancing dressed as haystacks, but it's still clear what is being emulated here.
Hot Summer was made at a brief period when a new, liberal socialism seemed possible in Eastern Europe, but by the time it was released it was business as usual for the Communist citizens. Taking that into account, this film must have been a breath of fresh air amongst the standard product in cinemas, and it doesn't toe the party line too strongly, even allowing a little dissent. The two groups of girls and boys do, for the first half, operate like collectives, with no one really standing out, but as the story draws on a love triangle emerges (almost a love square, in fact) with Brit (Regine Albrecht) leading on two young men to fall in love with her. Or so the film would have us believe, but she is no more to blame for the upset than the boys, making for a rather unfair perspective on her behaviour which ends up giving rise to violence and much ill feeling across the board. For this reason, more than any political themes, Hot Summer leaves an uncertain conclusion; sure, you can enjoy the camp songs, but the treatment of the mildly rebellious Brit raises some concern. Music by Gerd Natschinksi and Thomas Natschsinki. Watch out for the dog that sounds like an elephant.
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| Reviewer: |
Graeme Clark
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