Karla

East German romance about a non conformist young school teacher named Karla and a disenchanted journalist turned fisherman. Karla has finished her studies and gets employed in a village at the secondary school. She plans to use a radically different approach to educating, which will put great value on criticism, authenticity and autonomous learning. She also pursues a relationship of relative equality with her pupils. She is tolerant an reconciliatory, in particular with respect to a pupil who evidently opposes the political system (and even listens to the reviled western radio stations). The method alienates her from her bureaucratic colleagues, and clashes with the school curriculum. Fortunately the headmaster is an old Bolshevist, a former resistance fighter who loathes bureaucracy and supports her. He has to continuously protect her from the law-abiding school inspector. In the mean time, Karla gets acquainted with a former journalist. He is now a fisherman, because he could not bear the opportunist censorship, that undermined the credibility of his articles. The two good-natured nonconformists develop a liking for each other, in a tolerant and self-asserted fashion.