How quickly things change.
For his film “Paths to Power.
Germany's decision-making year, ”Stephan Lamby looks back twelve months, and what do we see?
We see a defeated SPD with a nominated candidate for Chancellor Olaf Scholz.
We see the Greens, who have great hopes, and we see a Union that is convinced that it will continue to be the determining political force after the end of Angela Merkel's reign.
Michael Hanfeld
responsible editor for features online and "media".
Follow I follow
One year and two fierce disputes over the top candidacy with the Greens and Union later, the SPD is on top with Scholz, the Greens find themselves with Annalena Baerbock disillusioned in surveys, not first, but third place, the Union is worried about their rank with Armin Laschet as a people's party.
Everything is open a week before the general election.
Nobody gets to their destination in the sleeping car
The “ways to power” are just twisted.
Anyone who thinks they will arrive at their destination in a “sleeping car” is just as wrong as someone who thinks he or she alone embodies the new beginning that the citizens of this country supposedly want.
In the end, perseverance could make the difference, or rather, give the impression that you are persistently working on good policies.
Slogans are sufficient to explain what this consists of in detail.
One of the strengths of the political filmmaker Stephan Lamby is that he reveals the mechanics of politics with his dry and inconspicuous way of observing and asking questions. He follows the events over the course of a year, shows how they play into one or the other's cards or harm and how the candidates and their staff react to it. He shows how election campaigns work. He shows how inadequate preparation takes revenge (Baerbock's curriculum vitae and book); how a moment captured in the picture (Laschet's laughter in the background when visiting the Erft), reinforced by the media and above all the storm of indignation on the Internet, digs itself in and like the one who at least makes mistakes and is entangled in a complicated network (Scholz and the cum-ex scandal), gets through best.Because simplification, signs and images count, more than ever in the digital age.
Everyone is available to answer questions
It's different with Lamby. This is why his films also stand out from the public television program. Images are arranged with ease. The election campaign staff are shown at internal rounds. Through cleverly selected interlocutors not only from politics - such as the virologist Melanie Brinkmann, the pianist Igor Levit or a woman from the "lateral thinker" scene - society comes into view. Then everyone from politics is available to answer questions and, even in short sequences, reveal more about themselves than in trialles and round tables and the egg dance, with which voters are covered until election day: Baerbock, Laschet and Scholz appear, Robert Habeck speaks, who looks a little battered and doesn't have to say that he would have been the better candidate for the Greens.Markus Söder has bowed to the judgment of the CDU leadership and, as a supposed candidate, gets along quite well. Christian Lindner shows how well he can with Laschet and indicates that there is an ideological gap between the FDP and red-red-green as deep as the Mariana Trench. Janine Wissler from the Left, on the other hand, is so happy about a possible left alliance that one thinks nothing can stand in the way of it. Alice Weidel from the AfD poses as a casual outsider who annoys her party that nobody asks for cooperation and acts as if an illegal party donation of one hundred thousand euros were “peanuts”.that between the FDP and red-red-green there is an ideological gap as deep as the Mariana Trench. Janine Wissler from the Left, on the other hand, is so happy about a possible left alliance that one thinks nothing can stand in the way of it. Alice Weidel from the AfD poses as a casual outsider who annoys her party that nobody asks for cooperation and acts as if an illegal party donation of one hundred thousand euros were “peanuts”.that between the FDP and red-red-green there is an ideological gap as deep as the Mariana Trench. Janine Wissler from the Left, on the other hand, is so happy about a possible left alliance that one thinks nothing can stand in the way of it. Alice Weidel from the AfD poses as a casual outsider who annoys her party that nobody asks for cooperation and acts as if an illegal party donation of one hundred thousand euros were “peanuts”.
The coolest thing is Olaf Scholz's response to Lamby's question as to whether he knew about the SPD's election commercial in which Union candidates (such as Laschet's Düsseldorf State Chancellor Nathanael Liminski) are personally attacked. Scholz excuses himself in an inimitable soporific way, so that one thinks: This is how you do it. He copied that from Angela Merkel. He doesn't say anything, makes the diamond, and everyone knows. Which means here: Scholz no longer needs such a number.
The Chancellor, who stayed out of the election campaign until a few days ago, also shows up.
If the Union were to lose the election, says the journalist Kristina Dunz, that would increase Merkel's fame in the end and maybe even give her personal satisfaction.
This is Lamby's final point, which he doesn't have to say himself.
“How Germany develops depends on who rules.” Whether it is a radical change under the guise of “Merkel II”?
Lamby's film is instructive.
Ways to power. Germany's decision-making year
runs this Monday at 8.15 p.m. in the first.