THE ROSE UNDER ANY OTHER NAME OR THE DEMISE OF BERLIN 1936-1945
As a follow-up to last year´s post about the air-raids that destroyed Southern Friedrichstadt and Luisenstadt areas of Kreuzberg on February 3, 1945, here are two films found on YouTube showing Berlin in its prime in the summer of 1936 and after its virtual death at the end of WW2.
In both of them you can see scenes filmed in Kreuzberg (f.ex. Stresemannstrasse formerly known as Saarlandstrasse). The film of 1936 has already been featured in this blog – it is one of very few films I have been able to find that show today´s U1 after having left Hallesches Tor and going along Gitschiner Strasse with the perfect view of Heiliger-Kreuz-Kirche in Blücherstrasse and the no longer existing part of Plan Ufer (the houses to the left of the temple seen 5´45´´ into the film).
Berlin in Farbe 1936 was a product of Nazi propaganda yet the beauty of the city it showed was real. The price this city had to pay for the success of that propaganda was, however, real, too.
Jonny Whitlam Photography
I’m not sure which film is more depressing
I know what you mean – both of them are even more so if watched one next to the other.
In the first film it’s the sight of nice red flags all over town, that group of Hitlerjugend children walking across Leipziger Platz who’ll all probably be dead within 10 years, or the less visible process of removing unwanted people from society that had already started… in the second it’s the apocalyptic cityscape, the lack of men, and especially that one exhausted Trümmerfrau, who may well have been victim of those happy-looking Soviet soldiers walking by. It’s amazing this city is a good place to live again.