"He wanted to go to Hollywood and made it as far as Moscow" goes the byline for Leander Hausmann's biting 2012 political satire "Hotel Lux", which opens our May GOETHE FILMS series.
A comedy that dares to go to the epicentre of German 20th century disaster and shame. It's Berlin 1938. Apolitical comedian Hans Zeisig (played by popular German comic Michael Bully Herbig) has made one too many Hitler jokes. He flees the city with false papers and finds himself between a rock and a hard place at the notorious Hotel Lux in Moscow -- a real historic place:
Russian baker Iwan Filippow´s delicacies were known far beyond the city of Moscow. In 1911 Filippow´s son expanded the family business, adding an additional four floors to the two-story bakery, which then became the Hotel Franzija. In 1933 two more floors were added and the hotel had been renamed
Hotel Lux, now offering 300 rooms for some 600 guests. From 1921 on, four years after the October Revolution,
the hotel became the accommodation for the Communist International, the Comintern. Moscow in the 20’s and 30’s was a mega-city at the dawn of a new era. The town was populated by a large, determined working class, and Stalin was the hope and the downfall of many who sought refuge and shelter at the Hotel Lux. Among them were communist officials who had to flee their fascist home countries and received asylum at what has become known as
the “boarding house of the world revolution”.
Guests and their visitors were required to obtain written permission to enter and stay at the hotel. Visiting hours were strictly enforced. Passports had to be turned in as a deposit -- even though most passports at that time were forged. The Lux was a secretive place – covert and conspirative on the inside and the outside – carrying many secrets.
There is no record of who resided there at one point or another, no guest lists, not even death rolls reveal that information.
To spend the night at the Hotel Lux was a privilege but not a luxurious one. The noble building housed, in shared, bug-infested rooms on the lower floors, future statesmen of international historical significance, such as Zhou Enlai and
Ho Chi Minh.
What was to have been a sanctuary became a trap for many people when, between 1936 and 1938, during the great terror, loyal communists were arrested and interrogated, accused of being enemies of Stalin. During Stalin’s “cleansings”, more leading German communists died than under Adolf Hitler. An atmosphere of fear and uncertainty dominated the Hotel Lux, where denunciation was common.
May 6, 6.30pm: "Hotel Lux" by Leander Haussmann (2011)
1938. Cabaret actor Zeisig flees Nazi Germany, finding himself in Moscow’s legendary secret service Hotel Lux and in the middle of a mistaken identity case where he is thought to be Hitler’s personal astrologer. What looks like fortunate circumstances quickly turn into an adventure between love and death.
A multi-award-winning historical comedy oscillating between drama and farce, with Jürgen Vogel and popular comedian Michael Herbig.
Next screenings on May 8 + 13!
GOETHE FILMS screen at the TIFF Bell Lightbox
35 mm, with English subtitles
Tickets $10, day-of sales only at the TIFF Bell Lightbox, open at 10am
Open to audiences 18+.
by Jutta Brendemühl
