The Night The Wall Came Down - Schabowski's Note

No one intended it, no one ordered it and no one was at fault; it was, in fact, a mistake that brought down the Berlin Wall on 9 November 1989. On this day, Günter Schabowski, Politburo member and spokesperson, was slipped a note by Egon Krenz, Politburo leader, which he took with him to his press conference without reading it. There he read it out to the assembled press in a live broadcast. The news flew about the entire world. Something unique was happening: for a few hours, the laws of the authoritarian state were powerless – and the people of East and West Berlin spontaneously took the task in hand themselves. A groundswell revolution and, almost casually, the end of the toughest border in the world. In the style of the TV series "24", the film follows the paths of the principle characters over this decisive day, hour by hour. For the first time ever we speak to the man who wrote the note. We interview Tom Brokaw, the NBC anchorman who reported live from the Berlin Wall that night, as well as the political advisors of the American and French President, of the German Chancellor and the British Prime Minister. And of course we speak to Schabowski himself, who did not know what he read when he read his note.

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