Die Rebellin (2009)

The story is inspired by real historical events surrounding the development of the German E 1 television receiver. Lena, a little girl passionate about technology, is the daughter of Gustav Berkow, an engineer in radio communications at the Neue Hakeburg estate. While fleeing the war in Berlin, he is killed. Shortly before his death, he had sold his invention, an improved model of the E 1, to a broadcasting equipment manufacturer in southern Germany. As he dies, he gives Lena a note bearing the name Sattler. This man owes him money for his research. Lena, her sick mother Hilde, and her sister Betty take refuge on a farm. While searching for Sattler, she discovers a radio factory in Fürth doing good business with the Third Reich. Lena manages to get in touch with Sattler. When the Allies ban the company from selling radios that have already been built, it starts selling kits instead. The charming Hans Sattler travels across the country selling them and happens to meet Lena. She falls in love with the factory owner’s son. His father, Wilhelm (who looks like Max Grundig), already has the manufacturing processes Gustav Berkow gave him and keeps them in his villa. Lena arrives just as Peter, Hans’s brother, who was believed to be missing, returns. But Lena’s mother destroys these documents, thereby preventing Lena from buying penicillin for him to treat injuries he sustained in an explosion at the hospital where her sister Betty is a nurse. Walter Juskowiak comes to her aid. When the production ban is upheld, Sattler hires Lena as a radio technician to set up a new company that will bear the name Berkow. Lena and Hans marry and have a daughter, Stella. At a trade fair, Lena meets Möbius, who disputes Berkow’s claim to have invented a new television receiver. She learns the truth from her mother. But before Lena can visit her, her mother burns the old letters and photographs featuring Möbius. The house then catches fire, and she dies in the blaze. Lena now wants to focus fully on training women television technicians. Hans spends most of his time building the “Stellaris” television factory. Since the televisions are too expensive for the general public and are of poor quality, Wilhelm Sattler decides to stop investing. The Federal Republic is now a sovereign state and allows Sattler to produce radios and televisions again. Wilhelm Sattler no longer wants Lena. Bronsky manages to find her work through his network. Sattler falls into a coma after a serious accident caused by his son, and Hans takes over management. Lena develops a new television model for the general public. But financial difficulties and the amount of time Lena’s work takes up put their marriage in crisis. A breach of contract with a mail-order company and a workers’ strike make the crisis worse. When Lena agrees to share the profits with the workers, Bronsky obtains general power of attorney from Wilhelm Sattler, who is slowly recovering, and dismisses Hans without notice. Hans drinks and attempts suicide, but the attempt fails. Lena wants to reconcile with her father-in-law, so she goes with Peter Sattler to Kleinmachnow, now in the GDR, to see the Hakeburg estate again, which has become the Karl Marx Party Academy. She discovers that her father, under Möbius’s direction, was not developing a television receiver but military technology. She then learns that Möbius has taken a new name, is an American citizen, and is a military adviser to the young government. Lena’s brother-in-law tells her that Möbius will be attending a congress in Germany. They go there and learn from Möbius that the E 2 is not an improvement on the E 1, but the name of the secret development program for an image-transmission system intended to direct a bombing raid, on which Berkow had been working. Möbius confesses to Lena that he is her biological father and that he bought himself a new conscience by working with the Americans. At Olga Schmitt’s initiative, Lena receives an invitation to America for her new invention, a remote control. When she arrives in New York, she is surprised to discover that Walter Juskowiak was the one who brought her there and is offering her a job at his company. Back in Germany, Wilhelm Sattler now wants to persuade his son to take over the company. Hans refuses because Lena deserves the position. He leaves for New York to find Lena. At the Empire State Building, where Lena had wanted to launch a paper airplane as a child, Lena, Hans, and Stella are together again.