1993 | 89 min.
Prince in Hell

By Wieland Speck

PRINCE IN HELL by Michael Stock (1993). The fall of the Wall wakes West Berlin up from a deep post-punk slumber, in which at least part of the alternative scene had submerged itself like in a vulture’s nest, right next to the Wall. Deprived of this “protection,” the subculture has to reorient itself: a haunting snapshot of an anarchist-gay reality that is irretrievably gone unfolds to a soundtrack by Einstürzende Neubauten’s Alexander Hacke.
 
East and West meet in anarchy when you watch this film along with “Banale Tage” by Peter Welz. Shot in the GDR like Coming Out but finished in the new Germany, it brings together a series of alternative actors, intellectuals, and artists who – based on a story by Michael Sollorz set in the late 1970s – are trying to save the communist idea. Short before the fall of the Wall and against all odds, a juxtaposition of these two films promises long discussions.