Balloon (2018)

2019 • 125 minutes

About this movie

Thüringen, Summer 1979. The Strelzyk and Wetzel families have been working on an audacious plan for more than two years: they want to flee East Germany in a self-made hot-air balloon. But the balloon crash-lands just before the West German border. The Stasi finds traces of the attempted escape and launches immediately an investigation, while the two families are forced, under extreme time pressure, to build a new escape balloon. The Stasi get closer and closer each day – a nerve-racking battle against the clock begins.

Ratings and reviews

North Korea had a "northern escape", East Germany had a "balloon". The collision of two ideologies in history has always been so painful. Impressed by the rigorous craftsmanship of the Germans, crossing the border in a hot air balloon during the Cold War may have been possible only for Germans. Even if it is separated by a wall into two political forms, East and West, the spirit in the bones of his own nation has not been lost, which is admirable.