AllMovie

Political allegory dominates this quixotic movie in a manner which only the residents of the newly unified Germanys are likely to be able to unravel readily, if they care to. The film story, based on an actual 1978 incident, was proposed to the East German DEFA studio by Ulrich Weiss, a young filmmaker who was banned from working altogether in 1983. The fall of the regime made it possible for him to make this long-cherished project, which is replete with the kind of symbolic characters and hidden meanings appropriate to works made under a repressive regime. In the story, a Christ-like young man pals around with a bunch of petty criminals and has a variety of strange experiences, culminating in his being on hand for a party by the side of a lake which suddenly drains away, to the disgruntlement and confusion of all.