8/10
Frank Beyer's Brevity in Showing Truth
29 September 2005
Trace of Stones is a film about Socialism in GDR or East Germany which is compared to a construction site in Schkona in the early 60's. It tackled sensitive and serious issues at that time without losing its touch of creativeness both technically (on how shots were developed) and script wise. The film was made through series of flashbacks yet it wasn't boring at all, actually it made you stick on the film by craving more information that will lead to the present.

The clash of personalities of the three main characters in the film, namely Balla, Kati and Horrath is very entertaining to watch. They played their roles efficiently thus creating a world full of emotions, from rivalry, love, anger, humor, etc. The theme of the film may be serious yet it won't fail to make the audience laugh at some scenes. The brevity invested by the filmmaker in doing this film is worth it, even though it was banned for two decades due to the issues it tackled about the GDR Party and Socialism, the re-opening of the film in 1990 made it an art-house hit in Germany and most of importantly its message was clearly conveyed to the audience especially to the German people.
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