Review of Coming Out (1989) by Ilona D — 11 May 2012

Twenty years on, and I stumble upon this film on Youtube, where someone has posted it in its entirety. What a serendipitous find!

Heiner Carow (of â??The Legend of Paul and Paulaâ?? [1973] fame), was a director well-known for putting off the East German authorities with his realistic, sincere portrayals of everyday life in a socialist country. Through the decades of his career he put Flower Power, rock music, and the transformative power of romantic love (even in the face of grim, drab reality) on the big screens of the GDR, giving those themes the attention and legitimacy they were essentially denied by the state.

In 1989, his subject is homosexuality: in the first and only East German film to openly deal with the issue, â??Coming Outâ?? portrays a young man torn between the woman carrying his child and the man with whom he has fallen in love. Philipp (Matthias Freihof), a young high school teacher, meets a colleague, Tanja (Dagmar Manzel), a shy girl who falls hard for him, and before you know it, they are living together and sheâ??s nibbling on pickled cucumbers straight from the jar, dreamily contemplating his naked physique while he sleeps. He genuinely cares for her, but then he meets a boy who also falls hard for him, and soon has to grapple with his conflicting desires and repressions, and come to terms with who he really is.

Itâ??s a passionate and moving story, honestly told, and Carow avoids any sensationalism or melodrama. In his commitment to authenticity, the gay locales he chose were real gay hangouts, clubs, and bars, and much of the background action is genuine, not staged. Many of the film's supporting characters are actual members of the underground gay cabaret scene of East Berlin, essentially playing themselves.

Ultimately, this film is a film about love and honesty, and a powerful plea for tolerance, not only for the gay community, but for all minorities in East Germany at the time. It also offers a rare glimpse of the realities of life in East Berlin just before the fall of the Wall in November 1989 (when it was released). If you enjoyed â??The Lives of Others,â?? where the era was artificially recreated, check out this film to see what it really looked like.