Karla (1965)

Karla Blum has just completed her university studies in Berlin and is due to take up her first post as a German and history teacher for a 12th-grade class at the Theodor Fontane Secondary School in a small town in the north of the GDR. The young, self-assured teacher wants not only to teach her students the curriculum, but above all to teach them to think independently and critically. Her unconventional behavior, which runs counter to the ideologically prescribed socialist way of thinking, elicits different reactions from students, colleagues, the principal, the school inspector, and the authorities. Only the principal, shaped by the war and the bitter experiences of the postwar years, who despises state bureaucracy, tries to support her. She also finds support in her equal and tolerant love relationship with Kaspar, a journalist who gave up his profession in protest because he was not allowed to expose Stalin’s crimes. When Karla receives an award from the school for her teaching, she realizes that, out of caution, she has given in to the school administration’s demands and—like Kaspar—has inwardly resigned herself. This realization prompts her to return to her original nonconformist approach. The school authorities seize on her private trip to the sea with Rudi, a rebellious student, as grounds to transfer her to another school. She is already on the train, about to leave the small town, when Kaspar jumps aboard at the last moment to join her.