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Baldiga – Unlocked Heart

Country: Germany, Language: German, 92 mins

Gay | Documentary | Flare 2024 | Teddy Award 2024 | 2024

Original Title

Baldiga - Entsichertes Herz

Director: Markus Stein

CGiii Comment

Back in 2019, Jasco Viefhues introduced Jürgen Baldiga to the wider world...with his deeply affectionate film Rescue the Fire.

Now, in 2024, Markus Stein has made, quite literally, a carbon copy of that original film...or, could it be considered an erratum. Two films, same subject, different results. By comparing both side-by-side, it becomes a congenial confrontation between romance and reality.

Jürgen Baldiga died in 1993 (aged 34). Jasco Viefhues was 13. Markus Stein was 28. Now, both Berlin-dwelling gay men...still a generation apart and separated by a differing perspective. Stein lived it, Viefhues ponders what was.

There was nothing romantic about HIV/AIDS - even in hindsight, the reality was grim. Jürgen Baldiga's reality was a mixture of drugs, delusion, hypersexuality and hedonsim...with limited means. He did not rub against the mighty shoulders of Mapplethorpe, Haring, Jarman et al., he found a little success in his own backyard...nothing compared to what it could have been...that's the romance of his story. The reality, according to this film, is that he would probably still be artistically scrambling in his own backyard...we'll never know. That's the grim reality of HIV/AIDS.

Still, an artist [in all of its shapes and guises], just like so many others, scrambling in their backyards...for the recognition that they [thought] they deserved...or, possibly not.

These filmmakers...retrospectively, thought they do deserve that recognition. Question...have they a vested interest?!?

Ouch...so cynical!

Trailer...

The(ir) Blurb...

Using diary excerpts, photographs and memories from companions, the film paints the portrait of the artist Jürgen Baldiga who sensitively and authentically captured the West Berlin queer scene of the 1980s and early 1990s with his camera.

West-Berlin 1979. Jürgen Baldiga, Sohn eines Essener Bergmanns, ist gerade in die Stadt gezogen und beschließt, Künstler zu werden. Er arbeitet als Stricher und Koch, schreibt Gedichte und Tagebuch. Mit seiner HIV-Infektion entdeckt er 1984 die Fotografie. Seine Bilder sollen die Zeit anhalten und die Wirklichkeit einfangen: Sie zeigen seine Freunde und Lover, wilden Sex und das Leben auf der Straße und immer wieder die lustvollen Tunten des Schwulenclubs SchwuZ, die zu seiner Wahlfamilie werden. Zwischen Verzweiflung und Begehren, Auflehnung und unbändigem Überlebenswillen wird Baldiga im Angesicht des nahen eigenen Todes zum Chronisten der West-Berliner Subkultur. Als er 1993 im Alter von 34 Jahren stirbt, hinterlässt er tausende Fotografien und 40 Tagebücher – ein einzigartiges künstlerisches Vermächtnis.