Hanna Laura Klar Interview with David Oswald, Portrait by Martin Loew
DO: How did you come to study at the HfG Ulm?
HLK: I did my A-levels in Ulm and a friend of a friend was studying at the HfG. We were at a party at the university and Vordemberge-Gildewart asked me if I wanted to study there. At first I said, "No, I want to study pharmacy or medicine." And then I did an internship in a pharmacy. But after two months, I got so fed up with it that I called the HfG to ask what I had to do to study there. I only didn't know what to study. I didn't want to do graphics, I couldn't draw, I didn't want architecture anyway and I wasn't interested in product design at all. Only Information seemed interesting. At the time, I was told that it was about learning to write for radio and television. So I thought, I can do that. Unlike the others, I had to take an entrance exam and write a review of a TV play. I had no idea and nobody helped me. I then did it all on my own – and they said ok, they would take me. However, I additionally had to take an oral exam.
DO: The Information Department was a rare choice. Most students came to Ulm to study design or architecture, of course, and hardly anyone in a text-orientated department.
HLK: Text-orientated is not true at all. Back then, they thought at the school that we would provide the texts for their products. We never did that. I had nothing to do with that at all. What interested me was the audio studio. But when I started, I realised that the department was already dying. To be honest, I was a bit confused because I always had a lecturer to myself. Paul Pörtner, Harry Pross, etc. and there were these [department] overarching subjects, film history with Dörries and Patalas. Later, I switched to Alexander Kluge and Edgar Reitz in the film department, because there was nothing else really left.
DO: Was Gert Kalow no longer there?
HLK: Yes, he was head of department at the beginning. But then he went to Hessischer Rundfunk. I was still able to do my diploma with him, even though he was gone. But Harry Pross was the more important person for me. I thought he was very good, but he left after just one year. The department had pretty much disintegrated and I thought, damn, what am I going to do now? If Pross leaves, I can leave too! I had friends who were studying in Heidelberg. I went there and studied philosophy and ethnology. I just found the students in Heidelberg so bourgeois. After two semesters, I wanted to go back to the HfG as quickly as possible. Fortunately, they accepted me again and even credited all my certificates from Heidelberg. Then I attended everything that was still available in Ulm and then joined the film department.
DO: And that was tolerated, that someone from another department was taking courses in the film department?
HLK: There were no "courses" in the film department, that's the wrong word, and you couldn't just take them either. When I wanted to come back, I was told that I would have to do a lot in the film department. The Information Department had not been cancelled, but there was only me as a student. I had Paul Pörtner at the time, a Swiss radio play author and writer. And Bremer, he was a dramaturge at the Ulm theatre. When everything was going haywire, I asked him if I could be an assistant at the theatre and that's what I did. I was so lucky because I got to know so many different things. At the time, I didn't know what I was really talented at. Theatre directing wasn't that exciting, neither was acting, and I found assisting boring. But this work taught me what I like to do, what I can and can't do.
DO: Let's go back to the beginning: was your basic year already department-specific?
HLK: Yes, I only did what was important for the department. Photography, for example. I didn't have to do the basic graphic design exercises, as I was completely untalented in that area. I wouldn't have been able to do that. I could have left straight away.
DO: You did your final thesis with Mauricio Kagel, a composer. That's also rare, since music was otherwise not a big topic in Ulm.
HLK: Yes, my thesis was entitled "The Acoustic Museum" and Mauricio Kagel was my supervisor. But it was only about music in a broader sense. We had the recording studio and there was a lecturer from the Siemens studio in Munich who taught us how to use the studio technology, i.e. how to edit and change sounds and music. My "Acoustic Museum" consisted of four rooms with four or five different types of music and sounds, each in the original and collages edited with a synthesiser and vocoder. I was fascinated by what you could do with Hitler's voice or the Beatles, for example. It was destruction on the one hand and construction on the other.
DO: That sounds unusually experimental for Ulm. Didn't the formal rigor and strictness prevalent in Ulm also influence you?
HLK: I'm more of an advocate of chaos. On the one hand, of course, you need a form, but you also have to be able to break it. If you know what you want, you can break the form. Otherwise you cling to it too much. You have to destroy some forms in order to create something new. This formal constraint also made me think about what is important to me. The great thing was that I had the best lecturers from all over the world there. It was an elite school and I think I made good use of that. The diversity of people and content wasn't available anywhere else at the time. Heidelberg, on the other hand, was so provincial, even though Mitscherlich and other good people were there. But in comparison, it was a completely provincial setting.
DO: What was it like after the HfG, how did you become a independent filmmaker?
HLK: Alexander Kluge went to Frankfurt at the time, as did his sister Alexandra, with whom I was friends. I was Kluge's assistant on the film "Occasional Work of a Female Slave" [Gelegenheitsarbeit einer Sklavin, 1973]. That's how it started. And Kalow was also here at Hessischer Rundfunk, and I was able to write a lot for him for the radio. Those were well-paid hourly programmes, you could earn real money back then. When I wasn't making a film, I wrote scripts. And then I made my first film here, "Marianne Finds Her Happiness" [Marianne findet ihr Glück, 1974], about two GDR girls [editor's note: GDR is German Democratic Republic, the then communist part of Germany] .
DO: Wasn't "The weaker sex must become stronger" [Das schwache Geschlecht muss stärker werden, 1970] your first film?
HLK: Yes, I made it in Ulm when I was still studying, or had just finished. It was with the Filmakademie Berlin and Claudia von Alemann from Ulm. I had written the film and offered it to WDR [West German Radio]. The editor said that they liked it and that I should make the film myself. When I replied that I couldn't do that, he just said that I would learn! So I didn't just write my first film, I also made it myself, in Berlin. I had the other women with me, but I was responsible because I had received the money from WDR. Then I realised that it can be difficult to work with women. And that it's not so easy with "The weaker sex must become stronger" (laughs). But the film turned out quite well. I learnt a lot in the process, also in terms of technique. We already knew in principle how a film is made. Thomas Mauch [editor's note: cameraman at the HfG from 1962 to 1968] had also explained camera operation to us. But we hadn't made a film ourselves yet. Fortunately, we had a nice cameraman and the producer from WDR gave us the editor [cutter] to take with us to the set. She then took notes and made sure that I always knew where to cut later. That's how it started. And strangely enough, once you've made a film, you can't stop. It has a power, a fascination. You have to be able to organise, you have to have a good eye and you have to be able to assert yourself. As a woman, it was really easy to be pushed aside back then. I always had to know what to do on the spot and give instructions. If there was the slightest hesitation, I was told: "Well, if you don't know what to do now, we'll leave".
DO: So has the "weaker sex" become stronger today?
HLK: I've always been strong. Otherwise I wouldn't have been able to do anything.
DO: But can you generalise anything from this?
HLK: I don't think so. I was just socialised like that, I was basically brought up like a boy. It was clear to me that I would go to university. My mum died when I hadn't even finished school yet. Fortunately, I had inherited something and was able to do everything in peace. But I had no one except an older brother as my guardian, who gave me the money. I think I grew strong at my mum's sickbed. I sat at my mum's bedside for a quarter of a year. There's not really much more that can happen to you. When you realise that from an early age, you're highly sensitive and at the same time you have to be tough as nails. Otherwise you won't survive.
DO: The book "Frauen an der HfG Ulm" says about you: "Hannelore Waller was the last student to graduate in this subject area."
HLK: My maiden name is "Waller", I was born in Wallerstein and was baptised "Hanna Laura". That later became "Hannelore". At some point, someone at school said "Hannelore" and I thought that was wonderfully uncomplicated. During my time in Ulm, I always had to understate a bit. For example, I never said that I knew all the operas there. Politically, of course, they were left-wing there and you just couldn't be too bourgeois. On the other hand, they were the great elite school. I was left-wing too, but that's just not my whole life. I married Michael Klar in 1964 and my daughter Ann was born in 1966. We divorced in 1971 and I kept the name "Klar" because I was already known as "Klar" as a filmmaker. I have been married to the architect Jens Jakob Happ since 1991. When I went to Frankfurt in 1972, I called myself "Hanna Laura" again – that was my life again. Here I worked with Alexander Kluge, then made films and wrote essays for Südwestfunk and Hessischer Rundfunk. I also studied sociology at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University and graduated with a degree in sociology. The HfG had an influence on me, but I didn't identify with it. I just took what was important to me from there. I don't know – I have a love-hate relationship with this school.
DO: But your HfG background probably helped when you wanted to make a film about Elisabeth Hartnagel?
["Sophie's Sister" from 2006. Elisabeth Hartnagel, née Scholl is the sister of the Nazi resistors Hans, Sophie and the HfG founder Inge Scholl]
HLK: What? No, the school didn't help any more. As I said, I actually have an ambivalent relationship with the school. That's why I didn't want to peddle it.
DO: The FAZ reported that the film about Elisabeth Hartnagel in turn convinced Beate Klarsfeld to make a film with you.
HLK: Yes, Beate Klarsfeld wanted to know what I had done so far. When I mentioned the film about Elisabeth Hartnagel and Sophie Scholl, she wrote back, "Hans and Sophie Scholl are our role models. If you make films like this, we'll make a film with you straight away".
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Citation
Hanna Laura Klar "Interview by David Oswald", Frankfurt/Main, 14 March 2013, in: David Oswald, Christiane Wachsmann, Petra Kellner (eds) Rückblicke. Die Abteilung Information an der hfg ulm. Ulm, 2015, pp. 164-167, available online at http://www.hfg-ulm.info/en/retrospective_hanna-laura-klar.html
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Martin Loew Set up in the niche: A portrait of Frankfurt filmmaker Hanna Laura Klar
Of course, it was not to be expected that Beate Klarsfeld would win the presidential election against Joachim Gauck. But at least her nomination has brought her back to the attention of a wider public, whereby she is usually reduced to the "woman with the slap in the face". However, the image that Hanna Laura Klar presents of her in her film "Berlin – Paris. The Story of Beate Klarsfeld", which premiered in autumn 2011, is significantly more multifaceted.
The filmmaker remembers the genesis of the project only too well: "There was an exhibition on the student movement of '68 in Frankfurt, which made me aware of Beate Klarsfeld once again. And a little later I read a very interesting interview with her, so I had the feeling I had to meet her." Klar wrote to her in Paris and also mentioned in the email that she had made a film about the Scholl siblings, who were among Beate Klarsfeld's great role models. That was probably the deciding factor. They soon met in Paris. The foundation for the film was laid.
The interest in extraordinary lives, in people who are unique or almost outsiders, runs like a guiding thread through Hanna Laura Klar's filmography. This is certainly also due to the special niche that the director has discovered for herself: "life history films". Time and again, she brings remarkable personalities in front of the camera, such as Beate Klarsfeld, the theatre man Einar Schleef, the writer Elfriede Jelinek or Elisabeth Hartnagel, the sister of Sophie Scholl. However, it is not only the fascinating biographies that make her films so impressive, but in particular her calm, very empathetic approach to the respective material.
This special perspective is certainly also the result of Hanna Laura Klar's extensive education. She initially attended the Ulm School of Design, where Edgar Reitz and Alexander Kluge were among those teaching at the time. After graduating from the HfG, she went on to study sociology in Frankfurt. The confrontational women's film "The weaker sex must become stronger" was made while she was still at the HfG in Ulm. Alexander Kluge supported his young student, who convinced the editors at WDR [West German Radio] with her exposé and was able to realise the film with five colleagues, Helke Sander, Ula Stöckl, Claudia von Alemann, Erika Runge and Susanne Beyeler. This was followed by work for television, mainly documentaries. But also TV movies such as "Marianne Finds Her Happiness" about two women who fled the GDR, and children's films such as "What do I eat when I'm full" about an overweight girl and "The Scream of Shi Kai", whose protagonist is abused by his father – outsiders, as Hanna Laura Klar always puts them at the centre.
The fact that a documentary film about a special person does not have to contain only talking heads is something she realises for the first time in "Al Copley – Painter and Scientist", a documentary commissioned by ZDF [Second German State Television] as part of the "Witnesses of the Century" series. Instead, she follows Copley through his everyday life and interweaves these observations with statements and interview passages.
The next project was dedicated to the writer Richard Plant. It took the Frankfurt filmmaker four years to get the financing in place. When filming could finally begin in 1998, Plant was so ill that he was no longer able to be in front of the camera. Alexander Karp, who completed his doctorate at the Sigmund Freud Institute in Frankfurt, then re-enacted the scenes from Plant's life for the film.
This is followed by the two-part film "Faust as Emigrant", a sensitive portrait of the theatre director Einar Schleef. The closeness that develops between director and protagonist during filming not only allows very intensive insights into Schleef's life and his reflections on culture and everyday life. He also encourages Klar to come in front of the camera. The interviewer should not remain hidden from the viewers.
After Schleef's death, Klar talks to his daughter, her mother and Elfriede Jelinek. This material is not only used to create the film "3 Women around Schleef", the Viennese author also takes Klar to visit her friend, the poet Elfriede Gerstl. Klar was so fascinated by the long-standing friendship between the two different women, Jelinek and Gerstl, that she captured it in the film "Elfriede and Elfriede". "The filming," says Klar, "took over a year. I kept visiting them in Vienna and in the end the conversations became so trusting that it was as if the camera hadn't even been there."
"Elfriede and Elfriede" in particular demonstrates the great empathy and patience with which Hanna Laura Klar approaches her protagonists. The Nobel Prize winner, who is actually very publicity-shy and likes to hide behind exalted outfits, was previously almost impossible to get in front of a camera, let alone in her flat.
The trigger for the film "Sofie's Sister" was another film. "I had seen 'The Last Days' in the cinema and was so impressed," says Klar, "that I couldn't let go of the subject. During research, I finally came across Elisabeth Hartnagel, the last surviving of the five Scholl siblings." And in "Sofie's Sister", Klar once again demonstrates her great strength in giving her protagonists space for memories and stories, thereby revealing the family background that characterised the actions of Hans and Sofie Scholl.
Her next work deals with one aspect of the Holocaust. In "Die Protokollantin", Klar portrays the doctor and psychoanalyst Alice Ricciardi-von Platen, who was appointed by Alexander Mitscherlich to the commission of observers at the euthanasia trial in Nuremberg in 1946. As the last surviving witness to the trial, Ricciardi-von Platen reports on the horrors of human experimentation and the murder of the mentally handicapped. She clearly succeeds in interweaving the horror of the words with the images of her protagonist's adopted home – Tuscany – to create an impressive tableau.
Time and again, it becomes clear that it is the special approach to the subject, the skilful handling of people and the empathy that characterise Hanna Laura Klar's life history films. Far removed from gimmickry and quick explanations, the films take the time needed to trace the lives of extraordinary people. At the same time, the films gain maturity over time that makes seeing them again and again a new, special experience.
First published in GRIP, journal of Filmhaus Frankfurt, issue 46, 2012.