Zustand und Gelände (2019)

In the spring of 1933, after the enactment of the so-called “Protective Custody Law,” the “Decree for the Protection of the People and the State,” the Nazis imprisoned more than 200,000 political opponents in so-called “wild camps.” These camps served not only as places of internment but also for forced labor, torture, and murder, and are considered precursors to the later concentration camp system. The term “wild,” however, by no means implies chaos or lawlessness. The camps were clearly organized, and the prisoners consisted primarily of Communists, Social Democrats, and trade unionists, as well as, in isolated cases, Jehovah’s Witnesses and Jews. The film shows places that were central sites of oppression and violence during the early years of Nazi rule. The SA ran these camps with the involvement of the police, municipal administrations, and other institutions. They were often located in public buildings such as gymnasiums, castles, or taverns. The crimes frequently took place in full view of the local population: in the Volkshaus in Reichenbach, Saxony, which stood directly beside the centrally located market square, the SA set up an interrogation room. There, detainees were subjected to brutal interrogation methods, some of which they did not survive. Local residents complained about the screams at night, which could be heard all the way to the market square. In response, the local Nazi Women’s League donated a “thick feather pillow, about 50 centimeters square,” which was to be used to stifle the victims’ screams by pressing their faces into it. The footage focuses on the Free State of Saxony, where the workers’ movement was well organized and the Nazi Party had many supporters. Moving across different periods, the film traces the history of these places from 1933 through 2011. Contemporary images of the sites are accompanied by spoken texts quoting archival materials, official correspondence, eyewitness accounts, and literary works. These different periods reveal how later generations reshaped these places, repeatedly reinterpreting them and putting them to new uses. The crimes, some of which are commemorated today with plaques, have been subject to changing cultures of remembrance. While Soviet monuments in the GDR established a culture of remembrance focused exclusively on “active victims of fascism” and excluded other perspectives, many of these monuments were substantially altered or removed after reunification. Finally, the film addresses current political conflicts surrounding far-right movements in the Vogtland and other parts of Saxony. These include the far-right terrorist cell National Socialist Underground (NSU), whose network was exposed in Zwickau in 2011.