Sun Alley

A “mufta” is a multifunctional table, a “Minetta” is a radio, mopeds are called “Swallous” and “Asthmakraut Halle”─ a special asthma medication ─ is the only recreational drug available. The Soviet Union is big brother, the rest of the world is the enemy of the people, and the Berlin Wall is actually a bulwark against fascists. This is the German Democratic Republic, the land where Michael lives. He wears bell-bottom’s and a home-printed rock & pop T-shirt. And the street he lives on wends most of its length through West-Berlin, with just its tail in the East. The apartment is cramped, the neighbor works for the secret police, there’s an uncle from the West to smuggle in pantyhouse, and a West German passport which causes his mother to age before his very eyes. But Micha is focused his goal: doing whatever it takes to win the heart of the prettiest girl at school. It all happened a very long time ago, but if Micha doesn’t tell the story now, we’ll never know what it was like, back then in the seventies, in the shadow of the Berlin Wall, at the hind end of Sonnenallee.