Changing Time (Quickly) 1988

Directed by Alexander Kluge

We see the celebration of New Year's Eve with fireworks in 1988, repeated exactly in 1923, in 1908, and in munitions explosions in 1812, as well as an air attack in World War II — and there is no difference in the image. Meanwhile, a group of women tries to remember the words of the third stanza of Schiller's lyrics to Beethoven's Ode to Joy. Freeways, clocks and the solar system form categories which shape experience, while Lenin's lying in state reminds us of the previous one we saw of Gardel. Martin Heidegger and Hannah Arendt are philosophers of the city, which is visualized as a gigantic clock. Finally, Freder in Metropolis tries to hold back the hands of the enormous clock/machine anticipating the turn of the century, 1900.