Well what can be said of the 'Socialist Musical'? When I saw this film advertised on Television, I was looking quite forward to it. I was expecting to sit down to 90 minutes of East Germans caroling their voices in soaring melodies extolling the heroic virtues of a glorious Socialist future, beaming faces carrying portraits of Lenin and Walter Ulbricht while farmers tilled the soil in song and factory workers rode out the latest Trabant Triumph. However, I was sadly disappointed.
Hot Summer, as it is called in English, is a delightfully bland East German musical made in 1967. The star of the film, Chris Doerk was somewhat of an East German pop star and this film was her vehicle. Basically Hot Summer deals with a group girls and a group of guys all off to the Baltic sea to enjoy their summer holidays. They've got the check-mini skirts, the patent leather shoes and these guys and girls are going to Rock and Roll their way into the 60's in East Germany. And it doesn't get much better.
The separate groups of guys and girls decide to have a competition and see who can arrive at the Baltic sea from Berlin first. I can't remember who won, but it wasn't important. What was important was the dramatic storyline. The guys decide to play tricks on the girls and then snogg (Kiss) them and vice versa. And there were the songs, slotted in at every available opportunity, and proceeded to become downright annoying. But hey, that's Socialism. The storyline was absolute drivel and dragged on considerably. I'm convinced the Production crew lost the script and ended up just re-using scenes. However, the scene where one of boys appears at the door to a barn wearing tight black jeans, plaid shirt, teddy boy hairdo and thumb firmly planted in his belt loop while his hips gyrate so fast it would have earned him an Order of Lenin singing some dreadful song is a scene definitely worth seeing.
