- Though well established within the East German movie making community, Heiner Carow had to manoeuvre when his candid, realistic work upset officials, but the popularity of some of his films and the recognition he got at festivals (like the Silver Bear in West Berlin in 1990) put him in a comfortable position, he was Vice President of the Academy of Arts in the DDR from 1982 through 1993. He was born in Rostock in 1929 and he had as his mentors veteran DEFA directors Slatan Dudow and Gerhard Klein when he was in the studio class for young filmmakers from 1950 to 1952. His The Legend of Paul and Paula was said to have played longer than any other movie in German theatres, and his Coming Out dared to treat the subject of male homosexuality for the first time in an East German film. Carow died in 1997.- IMDb Mini Biography By: Lawrence Chadbourne
- While still at school he turned to acting by playing in a youth theater. After graduating from school, Carow completed directing training in the DEFA youth studio in East Berlin in 1950. He then worked as a director in the studio for popular science films for the GDR film companies. Carow's debut film "Farmers Fulfill the Plan" (1952) documented the fulfillment of pig fattening contracts within the framework of the real socialist planned economy.
Numerous other documentary short films followed. In 1956 the director moved to the DEFA studio for feature films. Here he shot the children's film "Sheriff Teddy" in 1956/57. The youth film "They Called Him Amigo" (1958) conveyed anti-fascist messages with an exciting story. Carow's first serious experience of censorship in the GDR came with his film "The Russians Are Coming" (1968), which told the story of a Hitler Youth who pursues and hunts down a Russian forced laborer of the same age after he escapes.
The film was not approved in its original version, but was released in GDR cinemas in a modified form under the title "Career". The original version could only be shown in 1987. A similar situation happened to a film project "The New Sufferings of Young W." developed with the author Ulrich Plenzdorf, which was only later released as a play and story. Carow celebrated popular successes in the GDR with "The Legend of Paul and Paula" (1972) and with "Bis das Tod dir Dichet" (1977/78).
In 1977 he was accepted into the executive board of the Association of Film and Television Workers of the GDR. In the years 1982-1991 he served as vice president of the GDR Academy of Arts. Shortly before the fall of the Berlin Wall and the opening of the borders, the director drew attention to the living situation of homosexuals in the socialist German Republic with his gay drama "Coming Out" (1988/87) - a breach of a taboo for GDR society.
A little later, Carow presented a reckoning with the GDR's political system with the film "The Mistake" (1990/91), which, however, only met with a moderate response from critics. As a result, the director primarily made television series. In 1995/96 he documented the ferry accident of the "Estonia" in "The Ferry to Death". In 1996, Carow was temporarily appointed head of the film and media art department at the West Berlin Academy of the Arts.- IMDb Mini Biography By: Christian_Wolfgang_Barth
- SpouseEvelyn Carow(1954 - February 1, 1997) (his death, 2 children)
- Member of the 'Official Competition' jury at the 38th Berlin International Film Festival in 1988.
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