Central Studio of Children and Youth Films
named after M. Gorky
by commission of State Committee of the USSR Council of Ministers
on Television and Radio Broadcasting
SEVENTEEN MOMENTS OF SPRING
Part 3
Starring
Stirlitz - Vyacheslav TIKHONOV
Kathe - Yekaterina GRADOVA Erwin - Nikolai VOLKOV
Gabi Nabel - Svetlana SVETLICHNAYA
Isayev's wife - Eleonora SHASHKOVA Yemelyanov - Yevgeny LAZAREV
Hitler - Fritz DIEZ(GDR)
Göring - Wilhelm Burmeyer (GDR)
Himmler - Nikolai PROKOPOVICH
Kaltenbrunner - Mikhail Zharkovsky
Mueller - Leonid BRONEVOY
Eismann - Leonid KURAVLYOV Holtoff- Konstantin ZHELDIN
Pleischner - Yevgeny YEVSTIGNEYEV Scholz - Lavrenti MASOKHA
Narrated by Yefim KOPELYAN
Göring was returning from the front.
He spent all the day in the area
where the Russian tanks had broken through.
What he saw there, stunned him.
And he decided to go to Hitler and report to him.
There is no organization in the front.
Absolutely no organization, my Fuhrer, total mess.
No military discipline at all.
I've even seen there drunk officers!
The Bolsheviks' offensive is demoralizing the army,
instills terror into them, animal terror.
And...
It seems to me...
Göring, I forbid you... I forbid you to go to the front!
I forbid you to panic!
It's not panic.
It's true, my Fuhrer, and my duty is to tell you the truth.
Shut up!
You'd better mind your Luftwaffe, Göring,
and don't poke your nose into the things, which demand a clear head.
It's not for you! It's clear for me.
Don't go to the front again!
I forbid you once and forever!
For the first time in his life Göring objected to the Fuhrer.
He was crushed and humiliated.
He felt those "nobodies" smiling behind his back:
The Fuhrer's aides-de-camp Shmund and Burggorf.
In Karinhall the Luftwaffe staff officers were waiting for him.
When leaving the bunker, he ordered to summon his people.
Good morning.
The Reichsfuhrer has come.
He wants to talk privately.
See him to the sitting-room.
Please.
The Fuhrer cannot be the leader of the nation any more.
What's now then?
The SS troops are in the bunker.
Actually, this is not the point.
The Fuhrer's will-power is paralyzed.
He cannot take decisions.
We must address the people.
Göring wanted to say: "Yes, Heinrich, I agree with you."
But this black folder was in the way.
He knew that a Dictaphone could be mounted into it, and 2 hours later
their conversation would be passed to the Fuhrer.
You're the successor, which means you're the President.
Thus, I'm the Reich Chancellor.
"He can say anything he likes," thought Göring.
"The father of provocateurs cannot be an honest man.
If he were an honest man,
I'd agree to all his proposals."
It's impossible.
Only one person can be both President and Chancellor.
Who's that?
Where?
Over there.
Where?
Behind the column in a blue coat.
It was the funeral of Professor
of Medicine, Karl Pleischner,
who had been Stirlitz'
comrade-in-arms in the anti-fascist struggle.
Stirlitz felt like approaching the coffin and kissing the deceased,
but he couldn't do that...
Looking at Werner who was standing near the coffin,
Stirlitz only now realized
how the two brothers resembled each other.
Karl's younger brother, Werner,
didn't know that Stirlitz had got him released from the camp
where he had been thrown on a denunciation.
It was 8 years ago...
Since then he'd been living alone,
because his wife had left him the next day after his arrest...
Who's that??
Kaltenbrunner.
Does he also have bad kidneys?
Yes, he was Pleischner's patient for a long time.
For some reason Stirlitz suddenly remembered
Gedrich's funeral in 1942,
the man Kaltenbrunner had succeeded at his post.
The funeral was solemn. The Fuhrer himself came.
This gesture...
This gesture, precisely repeated by Kaltenbrunner,
reminded him of the events of 1942.
"They all want to be like
the Fuhrer," thought Stirlitz.
Shall we go?
Yes.
Do you have bad kidneys?
- Sorry? - Was he also your doctor?
Unfortunately.
Who will treat us now?
I don't know.
Yes.
02.20.1945 (06 hours 55 minutes)
Information to be pondered over. Himmler.
The Reichsfuhrer of the SS,
responsible for the realization of Hitler's racial theory.
Honored Doctor of Archaeology.
Married. Has a daughter.
Has a high-school education.
"Only one principle should exist for the SS member.
We should be honest, decent and loyal only towards
the representatives of our race.
Whether other peoples flourish,
or die from hunger interests me
only because we need them as the slaves of our culture."
Himmler.
Himmler started as the pupil of Strasser, the ideologist of Nazism.
It was Himmler who took part in the execution of his teacher,
after the latter had quarreled with Hitler.
But that treachery didn't help Himmler. People looked askance at him.
In Berlin he was regarded as Strasser's man.
That was why he was appointed the chief of the Munich
criminal police, a very humiliating position.
The other person would've given way to despair,
but Himmler was a man of action.
He started to create first concentration camps in Germany.
Once Göring wondered
if such practice could push away Paris and London.
"Never," answered Himmler.
"Our concentration camps
are humane instruments to save the enemies of national-socialism.
If we don't put them in camps, there will be a mob law.
In such way, they'll be completely reformed
and realize our rightness".
For his successful work in the creation of death camps,
the Reichsfuhrer of the SS Himmler, by the Fuhrer's order,
was appointed Vice-Minister of Internal Affairs.
For the first time he was not in Hitler's suite.
He was near Hitler himself.
He made the next step in the hierarchical ladder of Nazism.
Having returned to Berlin,
Himmler, together with his assistants
and the SS HQ chiefs Karl Wolf and Gedrich,
started to collect information on his friends and enemies.
On Ley,
Göring,
Hess.
He started to appear more often at the Nuremburg party congresses
together with the Fuhrer.
But he was not among the favored ones.
He was not one of the Reich chiefs.
He only guarded the Fuhrer's life.
Only when Himmler staged
an attempt upon Hitler's life during his travel around Berlin,
only when he shielded him from the blank bullet,
only then Himmler became Hitler's kindred brother,
as he himself put it.
Where did you come from?
Who is your master, honey?
So I think I should feed you.
Let's go.
Come in.
I'll bring you something here.
Information to be pondered over (cont.)
Himmler.
Himmler made his promotion not at the battlefields
and even not due to the organization of the concentration camps
in the USSR, Poland, Yugoslavia, Hungary.
That work didn't surprise anybody anymore.
"The great organizer of the cleansing terror," -
said the Fuhrer about Himmler.
Himmler had reached his greatest advancement
after the generals' attempt upon Hitler's life.
After that Himmler became a hero, the man who had exposed the plot.
Hitler awarded him and called him the most courageous Arian.
He delegated to him coming out at the meetings instead of himself.
And Bormann, Göring and Goebbels
had to greet Himmler
as they greeted only the Fuhrer.
Stirlitz thought that Himmler was one of the strongest figures
in the political layout of the Reich.
Of course, Himmler could start dealing with the West,
and would be able to keep in obedience the army and the SS
and build up a front against the Bolsheviks,
leaning for support upon the separate peace with the West.
But Stirlitz thought that
the allies would never start negotiations with Himmler
because to the whole world "Himmler" and "the hangman" meant the same.
So, was it Himmler then?
It meant that to carry out his mission
he had to contact Himmler.
02.20.1945 (23 hours 54 minutes)
Here, in Koepenick, lived his
radio operators Erwin and Kathe.
Stirlitz was violating the secrecy regulations
which he'd been strictly following for twenty years.
But now he couldn't do otherwise. Kathe was pregnant.
They didn't expect Stirlitz that night.
They came out for communication on Monday, and today was Wednesday.
Wednesday was the emergency day,
and Erwin realized that there would be some work.
Good evening.
You look wonderful.
You belong to the rare type of women
whom pregnancy makes irresistible.
Pregnancy makes any woman beautiful.
You simply had no opportunity to notice it.
No, I hadn't. You're right.
Would you like coffee with milk?
Where did you get the milk? Damn, I forgot to bring you the milk!
I managed to get some.
She desperately needs at least a little milk.
Yes, now we've got even two cans of milk.
And carrot coffee.
One should be crafty to get food for pregnant women.
Will you play for us?
Yes.
Did you check, whether they stuffed your air-hole with something?
- Yes, I did. What's the problem? - Nothing. Everything is fine.
Did your brothers from the SD invent some new filth?
It's possible. Who knows? Quite possible.
Humankind likes secrets.
What?
I got an assignment.
I must find out
who from the highest bonzes
is going to hold separate negotiations with the West.
They're having in mind Hitler's highest command.
What do you think? A funny task? Yes?
They think I'm all-powerful, since I haven't failed in 20 years.
It means I'm all-powerful.
It would be nice to be Himmler's deputy
or become the Fuhrer.
Hail Stirlitz!
I'm becoming a grumbler. Did you notice?
It becomes you.
How are you going to give a birth?
I don't think they invented some new way.
The day before yesterday I spoke to an obstetrician.
I don't want to scare you, guys.
Go on, baby. Go on.
Thank you.
I don't want to scare you, but I myself got scared.
That old doctor told me that during labor
he can tell the nationality of any woman.
I don't understand...
Go ahead, baby. Don't be scared.
First listen, and then we'll try to get out of this mess.
You see, women are crying
when in labor.
I thought they were singing.
You see, baby, they cry out in their native tongue,
in the dialect of the place where they were born.
So you'll cry "mummy" with a Ryazan accent?
What's to be done?
What about going to Sweden? I think I can manage it.
And you'll stay without any connection.
But I'll stay here.
She can leave only with you.
As a war invalid, you need treatment at a health resort.
There's an invitation from the German relatives in Stockholm.
They won't allow you to go alone.
It's HIS uncle who is registered here as a Swedish Nazi.
No.
We'll stay here.
It's fine.
I'll yell in German.
Well...
you can swear in Russian but with a Berlin accent.
We'll decide it tomorrow.
We'll think about it calmly, without heroic emotions.
Let's go, Erwin.
Our decision will depend on
what they'll answer me tomorrow.
- Ready? - Yes.
Let's go.
Yustas to Alex.
I'm still confident that not a single serious Western politician
will negotiate with the SS or SD.
But since I got the assignment,
I'm starting to realize it.
I think I'll be able to carry it out
if I pass to Himmler some information received from you.
With his support,
I'll be able to watch those
who are looking for the channels to start such negotiations.
02.21.1945 (04 hours 45 minutes)
Top secret.
Personal file on Kurt Eismann
(the 4th Dept. Of the Reich Security).
Reference on Kurt Eismann,
Obersturmbannfuhrer of the SS, member of the Nazi Party since 1933.
A true Arian.
Character close to Nordic, firm.
Maintaining good relations with colleagues.
Irreproachable in carrying out his line of duty.
Merciless towards the Reich's enemies.
A sportsman. Winner of the shooting competitions.
Excellent family man.
No discrediting liaisons.
Holder of the SS Reichsfuhrer's decorations.
I know.
Fine. You can go.
What is it?
I have also a splitting headache.
I'm dreaming of 7 hours of sleep, as of manna.
I never thought that insomnia was the most terrible torture.
You tell me.
Listen...
Sit down.
The point is that...
It's a strange case.
Today the chief called me.
Our chiefs are all dreamers.
They can dream because they don't have any concrete work.
And even a trained chimpanzee can give directions.
You see...
He's got a big grudge against Stirlitz.
Who?
Yes, yes. Against Stirlitz.
It's the only person in Schellenberg's intelligence
whom I liked. Whom I like.
He's calm and not a lickspittle.
He's not hysterical and doesn't show that false zeal.
I don't believe people who keep close to the chiefs
and make speeches at our party meetings.
They are nothing.
Chatterboxes and idlers.
And this one is silent.
I like silent people.
If your friend is silent, it's a friend. If your enemy is silent, it's enemy.
I respect them.
One can learn something from them.
I've known Stirlitz for 8 years. We were together in Spain.
In Smolensk I saw him during a bombing.
He's made of flint and steel.
Why are you using epithets? Are you tired?
Leave those epithets for our party bonzes.
We, detectives, should use nouns and verbs.
He met with her, she said, he handed her something.
Don't you assume such an idea?
No. I cannot believe that Stirlitz is dishonest.
Neither can I.
We should convince Kaltenbrunner of it.
Why?
What if he wants Stirlitz to be dishonest?
Why should we dissuade him?
Finally, Stirlitz...
is not from our department. He's from the 6th department, not from Gestapo.
Let Schellenberg dance.
Schellenberg will demand the proof,
and you know that the Reichsfuhrer will support him.
- Do you think so? - I'm sure of it.
Why?
I cannot prove it.
I'm sure of it, Gruppenfuhrer.
All right. What shall we do?
I think
that we should be honest with ourselves.
This will define our next actions and behavior.
Actions and behavior are the same things.
Fine.
I give you an excellent opportunity to be honest.
Take these materials and make a conclusion,
an honest conclusion.
And I'll use it as the basis
when I report to the chief about the results of the inspection.
Why me? Why should I do it?
Where is your honesty, my friend?
Ah?
Where is it?
It's easy to advise other people to be honest.
But everyone personally
tries to turn his dishonesty into honesty.
So to speak, to justify himself and his actions.
Am I not right?
I'm ready to write a report.
What report?
I'll write that I've known Stirlitz for a long time
and I can vouch for his loyalty.
Go ahead, write it.
To Gruppenfuhrer Mueller, Chief of the SS 4th Department.
I think that Standartenfuhrer von Stirlitz is a true Arian
devoted to the ideals of the Fuhrer and the NSDAP.
I'm asking for your permission not to hold an inquiry into his case.
Obersturmbanfuhrer of the SS Eismann.
Well...
Fine fellow.
I've always treated you
with respect and total trust.
And now, I've had an opportunity to make certain once again
of your high decency, Eismann.
Thank you, Gruppenfuhrer.
You have nothing to thank me for. I should thank YOU.
Take those folders and make up
a favorable report about Stirlitz' work.
I don't have to teach you.
The scout's skill, the detective's shrewdness,
the courage of a true National-Socialist.
How much time will it take you?
To draw everything up
and substantiate it by documents,
I'll need a week.
- 5 days. No more. - All right.
Don't forget to point out Stirlitz' work with that priest.
Kaltenbrunner thinks that through priests someone is trying
to establish contacts with the West.
The Vatican and things like that.
All right.
Good luck.
Go and have a good sleep.
- I cannot give you 7 hours. - What about 5?
Yes.
- Have a good sleep. - Thank you.
- Hail! - Hail!
02.21.1945 (05 hours 05 minutes)
Your I.D.
They are blocking the roads to the West and to the South.
What's up?
There was an alarm. We're looking for radio operators.
They've reacted quickly.
But it's rather naďďve.
Though it's true when you deal with dabblers who don't know Germany.
But I do know Germany. A boaster.
Why? It's not boasting.
If I didn't know Germany, I'd have taken this road.
But I drove Erwin through Neekeln. Fine, Stirlitz.
Would you like to search the trunk?
There're craters on the road. Be careful, Standartenfuhrer.
I'm always careful.
How did Pushkin put it? You're super, Pushkin! Son-of-a-bitch!
You're super, Stirlitz.
- Good evening, Mr. Bolzen. - Good evening.
Here are your cigarettes and matches.
Stirlitz used to go to this pub called "Elefant".
Maybe he himself didn't remember how it all had happened.
It was ten years ago.
He had to go to Spain.
He didn't know about it.
Knowing about it, the Moscow command
had arranged for his meeting with his wife in this pub.
Cognac and cigarettes.
Your successes are indisputable.
Hello, Gabi.
So...
Our successes are indisputable. Yes?
As usual.
I'm very glad.
And where is Frau Zaurich?
Her friend fell ill. She went to bring her some food.
What about a game of chess?
Gabi, you're not interesting for me as a chess partner.
I know.
Goodbye. I have some things to do.
May I come in?
Listen, Holtoff,
I'm giving you the task
of extreme importance and secrecy.
I'm all attention, Gruppenfuhrer.
"This one will dig the ground," thought Mueller.
"He is butting like a young horse.
He still likes our games. He's swimming like fish in them.
He'll do a hell of a job!
That's good.
I'll have something to bargain over with Schellenberg".
You have to study these cases.
It's Standartenfuhrer Stirlitz' work
for the last year.
This case concerns the retaliation weapon,
the atomic weapon and physicist Runge.
In general, the case is stinky, but try to dig it.
Come to me, if you have any problems.
That's all.
One more thing.
Examine the files concerning his activity at the front.
And find out if Stirlitz somehow
intersected with Eismann.
Where are the detectives?
- Gauptstubefuhrer Geppert is here. - Bring him in.
Hail Hitler!
Gruppenfuhrer.
Come in, Geppert.
Remember this person.
From now on you'll accompany him everywhere.
It's good if you follow him even from the toilet to the bathroom.
May I take it?
Pain, my pain, leave me,
at least for a while!
Like a blue-grey cloud
Go to my home,
From here to my home.
My country, show yourself
in the distance.
My country, my tender country,
I'd like to reach you so much,
At least some day.
Very far away, very far away
It's raining during sunshine.
Right near the river in the garden
The cherries are ripe on the trees.
Somewhere far away in my memory,
It's warm like in the childhood,
Though my memory is covered
With such layers of snow.
Thunderstorm, appease my thirst
Until I'm drunk but not dead.
Now again, as if for the last time
I'm looking to the sky,
As if seeking for an answer...
Pain, my pain, leave me
At least for a while!
Like a blue-grey cloud,
Go to my home
From here to my home...
End of Part 3