Spaziergang nach Syrakus | mit Charly Hübner und Lars Jessen

Special Screening with Charly Hübner and Director Lars Jessen

A trip to Syracuse and back—that’s what Paul Gompitz (Charly Hübner) dreams of. He wants to travel to Sicily to follow in the footsteps of the poet Johann Gottlieb Seume. There’s just one problem: it’s 1982, and Paul lives in the GDR. All his attempts to obtain official permission to leave the country fail. A visit to his cousin? Membership in the League for Friendship Among Peoples? A study trip? Everything is rejected! What choice does he have? Paul must plan his escape. What doesn’t make things any easier: He wants to return home afterward. Back to Rostock, to the Baltic Sea, to his wife Anne (Lina Beckmann). Paul devises a daring plan …

In *A Walk to Syracuse*, director Lars Jessen (*Mittagsstunde*) tells a story of insatiable longing and great courage, of deep love and heartfelt loyalty—and of the desire to see the world without losing one’s homeland. The film is based on motifs from the novel *Der Spaziergang von Rostock nach Syrakus* by Friedrich Christian Delius (published by Rowohlt Verlag), which in turn is based on the real-life escape of Klaus Müller. With subtle humor and profound emotion, the film reflects on German history—and, in doing so, explores in a surprisingly contemporary way the tension between freedom and belonging, as well as the question of how far one can go without losing the other.