DER GLANZ VON BERLIN
Directors: Antje Kruska & Judith Keil
Documentary | D | 2001
84 min | Dolby Stereo
35th Hof International Film Festival
2001
This is a tale of three women, three cleaning ladies, all in their 40‘s and 50‘s, and their search for happiness. And it’s them who give Berlin its shine. Ingeborg is pretty, lonely and unemployed. Always searching for a sense of purpose in her life, she is constantly on the look-out for a new cleaning job as well as for a man by her side. Both are very difficult to come by.
Gisela, a Berlin original, is the cleaning brigade’s ‘clown’ and responsible for making Berlin’s poshest shopping mall emerge spotless each morning. At home, Gisela experiences the well-ordered routine of 35 years’ marriage which nonetheless is a touching love story. Delia left Argentina as a young woman dreaming of becoming a successful painter in Europe. For twelve years, she has been cleaning the penthouses and lofts of well-to-do Berliners. Torn between her pride of being a good char and the feeling of betraying her dreams she is trying to come to terms with life in the German capital.