Free Land (film) explained

Free Land (de|'''Freies Land''') is a 1946 German drama film directed by Milo Harbich and starring Ursula Voß, Fritz Wagner and Herbert Wilk. The film was a work of propaganda made by DEFA in the Soviet occupation zone which later became East Germany. It uses a neorealist style to portray the effects of land reforms brought in by the Soviet authorities.^[1] It proved to be very unsuccessful on its release.^[2]

Cast

• Ursula Voß as Frau Jeruscheit
• Fritz Wagner as Neubauer Jeruscheit
• Herbert Wilk as Bürgermeister Siebold
• Hans Sternberg as Altbauer Strunk
• Aribert Grimmer as Altbauer Melzig
• Peter Marx as Altbauer Schulzke
• Oskar Höcker as Neubauer Kubinski
• Elfie Dugal as Küchenmädchen
• Kurt Mikulski as Siedler
• Karl Platen
  • Albert Arid

Bibliography

• Feinstein, Joshua. The Triumph of the Ordinary: Depictions of Daily Life in the East German Cinema, 1949–1989. University of North Carolina Press, 2002.
• Noack, Frank. Veit Harlan: The Life and Work of a Nazi Filmmaker. University Press of Kentucky, 2016.

Notes and References

1. Feinstein p. 27
2. Noack p. 256