Meines Vaters Straßenbahn (1980)

Rudolph Donath, married to Gerti and father of two young sons, Ralph and Achim, is a man of order, punctuality, and firm principles. He loves his job as a tram conductor because, just as in his life, everything on the tramway stays “on track.” But then war breaks out, and Rudolph is sent first to the front and later into Soviet captivity. Gerti desperately tries to support herself and the children on her own. Her enterprising but somewhat shady brother Hans helps her, too. The children cannot fail to notice that their mother is having a long-running affair with Alfred Fingerhut, an auto mechanic. Ralph, the older son, hates Alfred and longs for his father to return. Meanwhile, Ralph grows up and has to join the Hitler Youth. At the age of 13, he experiences the end of the war and the beginning of the reconstruction of the school system in the Soviet Occupation Zone. He is allowed to attend secondary school, where he writes for a student newspaper and learns that even under the new system there is no truly free expression of opinion. At last, his father returns from captivity, but the family has grown apart: Gerti, who now runs a small grocery store, has always acted pragmatically to feed the family, while Rudolph clings to his old principles and wants to work only as a tram conductor. But the trams are not running yet, so he is initially unemployed; then he has to take a job as a track construction worker, and only later can he return to his conductor’s position. Ralph joins the Free German Youth (FDJ) and completes his Abitur. He falls in love with Ursel, who soon becomes unexpectedly pregnant by him. After graduating, Ralph is still unsure about his career. He first works in an FDJ brigade building a dam. There he receives word that Ursel has left him and gone to Berlin. She writes to him that she intends to have the baby, even though he had never looked forward to it. Rudolph trains to become a tram driver. But on his first trip, he realizes that he cannot psychologically bear the responsibility for so many passengers and wants his lower-paid conductor’s job back. He feels like a failure, does not want to remain a burden on Gerti and the children, and leaves the family. Later, he has to go to hospital because of gallstones. Ralph visits him there, but Rudolph does not tell him how ill he really is. The family later learns of his death only through a newspaper notice. The story is framed by scenes in which the adult Ralph rides a tram through present-day Dresden, rebuilt in a modern style, and imagines that his long-deceased father is sitting across from him once more in his old conductor’s uniform, so that he can talk with him.