Concert film marking the 100th birthday (in 2021) of resistance activist Cato Bontjes van Beek. Concert film / DE 2010 / Director: Helge Burggrabe / 78 min. / Original version
Helge Burggrabe’s “CATO Concert Film” pays tribute to Cato Bontjes van Beek, who was executed at the age of just 22 on August 5, 1943, in Berlin-Plötzensee. She grew up in a family of artists in Fischerhude near Bremen and developed an astonishing interest in language, foreign cultures, and Far Eastern philosophy at an early age. In Berlin, she designed and distributed leaflets for the resistance group “Rote Kapelle”—and was arrested. Her letters from her nearly ten-month imprisonment are among the most powerful testimonies of a political prisoner during the Nazi era. Thus, with her active and intellectual resistance, Cato remains a timeless role model of courage and determination in the fight against oppression and lack of freedom.
Original texts by Cato are read by the well-known actress Julia Jentsch, who previously portrayed Sophie Scholl in the award-winning film. The narrator is Lorenz Meyboden, and the male roles are voiced by actor Christoph Jöde. The Cato texts, set to music by composer Helge Burggrabe, are performed by the renowned vocal ensemble SJAELLA, alongside music from the 1930s and works by J. S. Bach. The “CATO Concert Film” was recorded at the Fischerhude Church to mark the 100th anniversary of Cato Bontjes van Beek’s birth.
Doors open: 7.30 pmStart: 8 pmAdmission: free
The film will be shown in the original language without subtitles.
Trailer; youtube: Helge Burggrabe