Heimat Is a Space in Time

Using letters and documents, Thomas Heise examines his own family history over four generations in this monumental work. Language and images combine to create a haunting portrait of a family, a country and a century. What remains? Biographies leave traces. So do the passing of time. Thomas Heise examines how the one relates to the other in "Heimat ist ein Raum aus Zeit". The film follows the biographical traces of a family torn apart at the end of the 19th century and into the 20th century. It is about people who once found each other by chance, then lost each other. Their remaining children and grandchildren now disappear. It is about speaking and silence. First love and lost happiness. Fathers, mothers, sons, brothers, affairs, hurt and happiness in changing landscapes that bear different, interwoven traces of time. A collage of images, sounds, letters, diaries, notes, noises, voices, fragments. "Heimat ist ein Raum aus Zeit" is a reflection on time and the love in it, the people, in sounds, images and language. There is always a residue that does not disappear.