This is an exceptionally well-made mini-series that even after almost half a century still feels fresh. The plot concerns two half-brothers, the younger one an officer in the Hessian army, the older an involuntary private soldier, who are being sent to fight the insurgents in British North-America in 1776. The older brother takes the opportunity to look for his father who went missing 20 years earlier and was presumed dead... The acting is uniformly excellent, though if I had to single out individual actors it would have to be Hans Caninenberg as the father of the younger son and Heinz Baumann as Col. Rall, the commanding officer of the Hessian regiment sent overseas. The sets are stunning, with an incredible attention to detail (and obviously everything is real, no CGI), and the music is wonderful: baroque in the scenes at the court of the landgrave of Hesse, but when someone thinks or talks of America the coolest jazz - and this is in no way jarring or discordant. You immediately know that these are entirely different worlds. The pacing is calm like in many German 1970s films, but 'Der Winter, der ein Sommer war' is still hugely suspenseful.
Historical note: The mini-series presents the landgrave of Hesse as a sovereign, absolutist ruler. This matches the view of 18th-century Germany dominant up to the emergence of modern research from the 1970s onward, but is incorrect. The landgrave was in financial trouble precisely because he was neither absolute nor sovereign. On the one hand, the Hessian 'Ritterschaft' (parliament) had refused to grant further taxes, on the other, the 'Reichstag' (imperial diet) in Regensburg threatened to place Hesse under forced administration by an imperial debit commission (the usual procedure when a member state of the Holy Roman Empire was in danger of defaulting on its debts). In that situation, accepting British subsidies in return for the Hessian regiments sent to America seemed a good way out, and a way of which the 'Ritterschaft' approved. Most of the Hessian troops were in fact reasonably well-paid volunteers, and very few deserted while still in Germany.
Historical note: The mini-series presents the landgrave of Hesse as a sovereign, absolutist ruler. This matches the view of 18th-century Germany dominant up to the emergence of modern research from the 1970s onward, but is incorrect. The landgrave was in financial trouble precisely because he was neither absolute nor sovereign. On the one hand, the Hessian 'Ritterschaft' (parliament) had refused to grant further taxes, on the other, the 'Reichstag' (imperial diet) in Regensburg threatened to place Hesse under forced administration by an imperial debit commission (the usual procedure when a member state of the Holy Roman Empire was in danger of defaulting on its debts). In that situation, accepting British subsidies in return for the Hessian regiments sent to America seemed a good way out, and a way of which the 'Ritterschaft' approved. Most of the Hessian troops were in fact reasonably well-paid volunteers, and very few deserted while still in Germany.
