Sehnsucht nach dem ganz Anderen

SEHNSUCHT NACH DEM GANZ ANDEREN begins with a long panning shot of Hamburg Central Station. Filmed in grainy black and white and accompanied by jazz music, this place promises more than just the simple routine of getting on and off trains. The film’s protagonist (Peter Zadek actress Elisabeth Stepanek) heads straight into the strangely somnambulistic world of a night train and starts searching through the sleeping passengers’ luggage. It is at first a tender, then increasingly enthusiastic approach to her surroundings, an immersion into the intimate details of private lives on anonymous terrain. In the end, the secret inner life of the suitcases is scattered across the narrow aisles of the train compartments. A quasi-metaphorical image for curiosity that can reveal the very details of our world.