Main train stations, snack bars, prefabricated buildings. For most people, these are places they want to leave rather quickly. Not so for Clemens Meyer. In his stories, the Leipzig writer remains at such locations and follows the people who populate them – outsiders on the fringes of society. This is also the case in his collection of stories “Die stille Trabanten”, which will be filmed in cinemas on December 1st.
A great ensemble has come together for this. Martina Gedeck, Nastassja Kinski, Albrecht Schuch and Peter Kurth are among them. “The Silent Trabants” follows the lives of several people in Leipzig, some of whom are loosely connected. They are all lonely, struggling, and enjoying the brief moments of interpersonal happiness that are bestowed on them over time.
One likes to watch the people in this film, which is partly due to the great actors. And on the other hand, Meyer’s storytelling, which manages to combine the tender with the brutal – and always very casually and subtly. Meyer wrote the screenplay together with director Thomas Stuber, as with “In the gangs”.
The search for security
For example, he talks about the life of snack bar operator Jens (Schuch). He stands with an apron between his sizzling chunks of meat, shakes hands with his customers and, you don’t know why, seems tender and loving. He falls in love with his neighbor Aischa (Lilith Stangenberg), who has converted to Islam and secretly smokes with Jens in an outdoor area of the prefabricated building where they live.
Then there is the cleaner Christa (Gedeck), who works at the train station, as well as the hairdresser Birgitt (Kinski in her first major film role in a long time). With sparkling wine and Mariacron, the two start talking and from now on they meet more often in a station pub. “And you, do you have someone?” Christa asks once. Another time she puts her hand on the table. Very carefully, Birgitt first puts hers in and then pulls her away. Short conversation, and Christa puts her hand on the table again. Birgitt hesitates – and then just grabs the lighter that is lying next to it.
There are many such scenes in “The Silent Trabants” that tell of the search for security. The focus is on the intimacy that the characters timidly negotiate with each other in the individual episodes.
Nocturnal figures in satellite towns
It is mostly at night. This is also the case with security guard Erik (Charly Hübner), who develops feelings for young Marika (Irina Starshenbaum) while walking around the grounds of a hostel for refugees. They start a conversation through a fence. Later, Erik masturbates leaning against a container wall as a reminder. A bleak scene, which is not disparagingly, but somehow sympathetically told.
Like the story of Jens and Aischa, which will end before it can really begin. “You can see the lights of the satellites in a moment,” he once said to her as they were smoking into the sunset. He means the high-rise buildings in the area.
Satellite cities are large housing estates – but in astrology satellites describe celestial bodies that orbit a planet. They never get very close to their object of attraction. Jens and the other characters have a similar fate in “The Silent Trabants”.
The quiet satellites, Germany 2022, 120 minutes, FSK from 12, by Thomas Stuber, based on short stories by Clemens Meyer, with Martina Gedeck, Nastassja Kinski, Charly Hübner, Irina Starshenbaum, Peter Kurth, Albrecht Schuch, Lilith Stangenberg, Adel Bencherif, Andreas Doehler
