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Jeden Monat nähern sich unsere Kolumnisten, die Berliner Filme macher Each month our columnists, Berlin-based filmmakers Dominik and
Dominik und Benjamin Reding, dem jeweiligen Heftthema auf ihre ganz Benjamin Reding, approach the respective issue-specific theme in their
eigene Art und Weise. Geboren wurden die Zwillinge am 3. Ja nuar 1969 very personal way. The twins were born on January 3, 1969 in Dort-
in Dortmund. Während Dominik Architektur in Aachen und Film in Ham- mund. Whilst Dominik studied architecture in Aachen and film in Ham-
burg studierte, absolvierte Benjamin ein Schauspielstudium in Stuttgart. burg, Benjamin graduated in acting studies in Stuttgart. They started
1997 begann die Arbeit an ihrem ersten gemeinsamen Kinofilm „Oi! Warn- working on their first joint motion picture “Oi! Warning“ in 1997. Since
ing“. Seitdem arbeiten sie für Fernseh- und Kinofilmprojekte zusammen. then they have tightly collaborated for TV and cinema film projects.

I magine the following like a still life by Alexander Kanoldt, a portrait by Georg “Otherwise, it isn’t worth it.” And I agreed. As arranged, we met with Tommy and An-
Schrimpf, a suburbia scene by Gustav Wunderwald, Reinhold Nägele, Carl Grossberg,
nika in front of the garages. Exhilarated and eager, for them it was just a new game that
like one of those pictures from the period of the New Objectivity where everything is might be promising an adventure. We, in contrast, were serious about it. Selling … this
given the same importance: the cactus, the matchbox, the window, the flowered cur- meant addressing adults, convincing them how attractive these bits of lawn were and
tain in front of it, the tablecloth below it and each traffic sign, each blade of grass, each well worth the 50 pfennigs. And since everything was new and completely unfamiliar,
kerb bollard behind it. We dithered, we pondered, we debated. We had an oversized, we decided to sell the bits of lawn in a place we had never been to before: at the wide
superhuman task fit for Titans in front of us. We wanted to sell something. A bit of street behind the estate of terraced houses! We boldly trudged ahead, past the parking
lawn. Quite typical, really, with dandelions and daisies. The sun was low above the place, even past the last row-house garden at the very back. And then, between two
harvested field, in the days before the very cold time arrives, when the distances seem ash bins, the view opened: The street was as wide as a square and, perhaps because
to become greater and the view clearer. The hearing as well, more alert, paying atten- it was really located somewhat cut-off, somewhat forgotten behind the new estate, it
tion to every little thing, the crackling of the ice beneath the feet, the hoarse barking of was hardly used by cars and empty of people. And in front of us, on the other side of
the farm dogs, far away. Early, too early, the first, still thin snow had fallen, it had du- the street, wooden-block houses were rising! Like out of our children’s building kit, the
sted white the black, ploughed field opposite the estate of terraced houses. We had windows and doors at the façades arranged in such a way that they resembled serious,
been playing until we were exhausted with two children from next door and now, out almost grim faces. Many years later, I learnt that such houses had been constructed in
of breath and hot, with hats, tiny coats and thick scarves, we leaned against the garden the 1930s, that they are called “coffee mills” with their square form, the pyramid roof
chairs left abandoned out on the terrace and, in the light of the low sun, for the first and the chimney in the centre of the roof ridge; and that those houses in the remote
time consciously saw something the position of the sun usually kept hidden all year. street had formerly been constructed for the engineers of a neighbourhood factory, con-
We saw the lawn near the picket fence which there, where the blades of the mower structed full of hopes and with all the savings of the building clients, young couples
could not reach it, was a leftover of wild-growing meadow, with blowballs, undaun- with their first, their second child and then first the spouses and then also the children
tedly blooming daisies and mysterious grasses which our mother grumpily called went to war and of the happy families only the widows remained, alone in the houses
“weeds”. The sun quickly made the snow melt, made the whose plaster became cracked and overgrown by ivy.
drops of water on the leaves and blades glitter like crystal There, in front of one of those houses, we put the orange
glass. “Oh!”, we said. And decided to sell this miracle. crate down on the pavement, the four preserving jars on
Sell? Sell! But what is this? How does it work? We ponde- top of it, and waited, and waited, and waited and … There!
red, we deliberated, we diligently discussed our plan and At long last! Two pedestrians! A young couple. They saw
the two neighbours’ children, whose names and whose us, stopped walking and my brother asked in a faltering
faces have disappeared from memory (and to whom, for voice: “Do you want to buy?” And then, my brother was
simplicity’s sake, I shall give the names Tommy and An- clenching his fists due to the inner effort: “Only 50 pfen-
nika typical of that time), listened, at least this is how it nigs!” But the two shook their heads and walked on, amu-
seemed to us, with interest. What buying was, we had al- sed for a reason we didn’t understand. The afternoon
ready seen. When going to the supermarket with the pa- went by, the sun went down, Tommy and Annika became
rents, at the meat counter, for instance, where we were restless, whiny. They had expected a wild, exciting game
also given a slice of sausage as a present. And which we, and now nothing at all was happening. How boring this
the saleswoman attached much importance to this, were “selling” was. They took off, without saying goodbye. But
to eat in her presence, or had to do so, respectively (and Foto: Benjamin Reding we as well became doubtful. Maybe something was wrong
which we also did); or, whenever the parents afterwards about this “selling”, maybe it was simply indecent to ask
stood in a long queue of people in front of a machine 50 pfennigs for bits of lawn which, after all, we looked
which was ringing, buzzing, clicking and they took out printed paper notes they called around and saw growing abundantly even here. And suddenly, without talking about
“money” and handed them to a white-coated woman at this machine. So, this was buy- it, we were embarrassed. “What have you got there?” We had not seen the elderly lady
ing. But selling? “We have to do it tomorrow.” We pointed to the sun going down, but coming. She critically inspected the four jars. The lady was – even if to a four-and-a-
this was only a pretended argument. Our plan, the selling, was so demanding and com- half-year old almost every fellow human being seems to be “old”, really elderly. The
plex for us as four-and-a-half-year olds that we had to prepare it without any distracti- hair grey, the skin wrinkled, the movements slow and tentative. “These are our flower
ons, without Tommy and Annika. We grabbed knives and spoons from the dining table arrangements.” (My brother really said “flower arrangements”, perhaps he had once
at home, got us four empty preserving jars out of the storage cellar and an old, wooden heard adults talk like that). “I see”, she said, “what does one of them cost?”, and poin-
orange crate, as a “sales counter.” Our first shop design. After lunch, we escaped into ted to the largest and, as I thought, also the most beautiful jar. Now I was hoping that
the garden, ran up to the picket fence, critically looked at the thickest tufts of grass and, my brother wouldn’t say 50 pfennigs. “50 pfennigs!” My brother shouted it, very deter-
using knives and spoons, dug up the four most attractive ones of them (with blooming mined. And although his voice was a bit trembling. She considered, then looked at us,
grass, many daisies and phantastic “weeds”) and crammed them into the preserving at the “sales counter”, the preserving jars. “Well then, let me look”, she pushed the
jars. But how much was it going to cost? What does a bit of lawn with flowers cost? As enormous sum of a fifty-pfennig coin into my brother’s hand. “I shall put them in my
children, this was clearer to us than today, we knew one could never “make” some- window.” For a short moment, a smile displaced the wrinkles in her face. She nodded
thing like this oneself: blowballs, lawn, drops of water. But there was a lot of picket to herself, took the jar and walked on. Into one of the ivy-overgrown coffee-mill houses.
fence and many daisies and even more lawn, it could not be all that expensive. “50 And now we left as well. Once we were home, we planted the three remaining bits of
pfennigs”, my brother resolutely said. Incredible! That much money, that was worth lawn back at the picket fence, among the other dewy herbs, grasses and blowballs
more than three, four water ices, but my brother vehemently defended his suggestion: which, and we really felt this, they were actually priceless.

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