Ware für Katalonien

Based on a true story: At the end of the 1950s, the production of optics in the German Democratic Republic has reached top quality and instigates interest in the West. When national demand rises strongly and at the same time the export to South America heavily decreases, the Volkspolizei – the GDR police force – starts to look into the case. Two seemingly unrelated cases are the starting point for the investigation by second lieutenant Schellenberg of the department for optics racketeering: An old woman who was arrested in the Berlin city railway for trying to smuggle a pair of binoculars to West Berlin, and a dead person in an area of allotments who was involved in obscure dealings with optical devices. Traces lead the inspectors to "Kant-Klause", a pub that turns out to be the meeting point of a gang that smuggles valuable devices from the GDR via West Berlin to Spain. Head of the gang is the unscrupulous Hasso Teschendorf, called "the Spaniard", who does not stop at murder to reach his goals. Although Teschendorf escapes them, the police are able to arrest the smuggler Bob Georgi, who is engaged to the unsuspecting East Berlin girl Marion. Schellenberg is also successful in his private life when he gets romantically involved with the helpful Sabine, a shop assistant for optics.

The contents of this entry were funded with the support of the DEFA-Stiftung.