When Bachmann didn't know what to do next, his partner sent him into the forest.
Bachmann had already given up his class, 6b, by then, he had long since reached retirement age, but had hung on for another year and was not sure whether another should follow.
He had already put his name on a list from the education authority, but wasn't it time for a line to go, for other dreams?
His girlfriend then sent him into the forest for three days, with a survival kit and the announcement: “You only come out if you have made a clear decision.” Bachmann smiles and looks out from the Marburg staircase towards the river.
“It was very difficult for me.
I just couldn't stop. "
Jörg Thomann
Editor in the "Life" section of the Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung.
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Stop?
For heaven's sake.
Anyone who watches Maria Speth's film documentary “Herr Bachmann und seine Klasse”, which accompanies this teacher and his protégés through the sixth year of school, could be tempted to demand a lifetime contract for the man.
The critic of a trade journal raved that the documentary gave you back "at least for the duration of your belief in humanity", which is a bit exaggerated, but you may believe in a good and humane school for a while afterwards.
That is not little for a small, albeit very long documentary film that, at 217 minutes, exceeds half a school day.
Correct AC / DC strings
At first glance, the teacher Bachmann seems out of date. With a gray beard, lumberjack shirt and knitted hat, he sits in front of the students of his 6b in the Georg Büchner Comprehensive School in Stadtallendorf and tells the twelve to fourteen year old a bizarre story about a table that falls in love with a guitar and gives it new strings , so real "AC / DC guitar strings". The students, socialized more in hip hop, listen. In the reading hour, Bachmann reaches for Karl May, at the Christmas party he belts out “Knockin 'on Heaven's Door” in front of the children and their appendix. Otherwise, music is often played in the classroom full of instruments, and there is repeated jamming and singing. A student like Jaime has been playing the guitar for a long time, but also Hasan from Bulgaria, who has only been living in Germany for a year,can be heard on the drums.
When you see the two of them again for a conversation in Marburg, you would hardly have recognized them, despite the guitar case and African drum. It was shot in 2017, Speth spent a long time shaping the long hours of material, then there was Corona, in February the Berlinale, where the film won a Silver Bear, now it is finally coming to the cinema - and the boys have long since become young men. Jaime is 16 and is in eleventh grade, Hasan is 18, has graduated from secondary school and has just started an apprenticeship as a vehicle mechatronics technician. Bachmann has not changed, who also wears a knitted hat on this day and, although he is no longer the teacher of the two and Jaime now calls him Dieter, continues to lovingly set the direction. Because he knows that a hungry Hasan gets in a bad mood easily,Bachmann wants to send him to the snack bar before the interview. The idea of making music here afterwards naturally also came from him.