1988: A year in which men slogged through the forests of the Eifel for survival training, while the steelworker families of Duisburg-Rheinhausen fought daily for the real survival of their "hut", the Krupp steelworks. In the end, they had to live with a compromise.
Die Toten Hosen sang cheekily-ironically about a thousand good reasons to be proud of our country - and were one themselves. They successfully played theatre in Bad Godesberg ("A Clockwork Orange") and celebrated their first big hit: "Hier kommt Alex".
Bochum became Broadway. The "Starlight Express", the German version of the fastest musical in the world, now stopped here. Karin Kube from Hattingen was probably the only fan the musical came home to: TV star Rudi Carrell surprised the young mother by having the cast whizz through the old town of Hattingen.
At the Olympic Games in Seoul, decathlete Jürgen Hingsen was eliminated in the very first competition - after three false starts. The result: he earned a lot of ridicule and scorn. The Duisburg-born athlete bravely and openly tells us how he dealt with this.
During the Gladbeck hostage drama, journalist Udo Röbel climbed into the gangsters' car in the centre of Cologne - and was right there when history was made. In the film, the eyewitness reports on his impressions and critically reviews his behaviour in a criminal case the likes of which had never been seen before in the Federal Republic.
The film is narrated by Jörg Hartmann, the well-known investigator from the Dortmund "Tatort". He was born in Hagen and grew up in Herdecke.
First broadcast: Friday, 5 October 2018, 8.15 p.m., WDR
OUR LAND 1988 - A Thousand Good Reasons
1988: A year in which men slogged through the forests of the Eifel for survival training, while the steelworker families of Duisburg-Rheinhausen fought daily for the real survival of their "hut", the Krupp steelworks. In the end, they had to live with a compromise.
