The Sound of Friendship
Warm Wavelengths in a Cold, Cold War
a film by
Anandita Bajpai
ABOUT
The Sound of Friendship is a documentary film which tells the story of an international broadcasting station from the German Democratic Republic (GDR)–Radio Berlin International (RBI) and its Indian listening publics. Aired from the Funkhaus at Nalepastrasse in East Berlin from 1967 to 1990, the station's Hindi programme catered to thousands of listeners in rural and semi-urban India. The film recounts the perspectives of East German/Indian presenters, behind microphones, and listeners behind the radio sets. It takes viewers from locales in Berlin to Madhepura, Bihar where we trace the trajectory of one of RBI’s listeners’ clubs from the 1980s called the ‘Lenin Club’.
How did cross-border friendships develop between listeners in India and journalists in East Germany? How are these connections remembered today, more than 30 years after the station's closure? The film not only brings together the (often) lost pasts of the radio station and its presenters’ biographies, but is also a channel of communication between listeners and radio voices that have never met in person. Shot in India in 2019 and Germany in 2020 and 2021 (in the midst of challenges posed by COVID-19), the documentary revives the mood of the times when radio frequencies weren’t just used for acoustic competition across the Cold War 'Iron Curtain' divide, but also to forge a warmth across two continents.
Title Track
Trailer
Events
Fri, 13 JanBern
Mon, 28 MarNew Delhi
Tue, 19 OctBerlin
Details
Runtime: 63 minutes
Premiere: November, 2022
Countries of Filming: Germany, India
Language(s): German and Hindi
with English Subtitles
Director's Vision
As an academic, I have been fascinated by cinema as a medium. I have often used films as sources for teaching in the classroom. My research on radio listening in Cold War India and its links to the German Democratic Republic made me realise that these stories deserve more than published articles.
One of the interlocutors from the film had recounted to me "The Cold War was cold only in its name. It had a heat to it. We were all heated up hot warriors! Each one picked their side of the camp. I chose the side where there was a warmth of relationships" (A.Srivastava).
Warm Wavelengths is an attempt to celebrate the trajectories of people, who usually only make it to short and rather invisible 'thank you' footnotes in books. As a female scholar from India, who has been based in Germany for quite some years, it was both stimulating and challenging to film in largely male spaces of socialization in present day Bihar, India. I do hope that the film takes audiences through the "warmth" of the Cold War, which I experienced throughout the shooting.
Anandita Bajpai
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