Former East/Former West was shot in Berlin three years after German reunification. Comprised largely of street interviews conducted in various parts of the city, the video documents Berliners' feelings about their national identity. For forty years, people in this divided city lived radically different lives—ideologically, economically, socially and politically. These differences were also reflected in their everyday routines, relationships and experiences, leading Silver to ponder what the two Germanys have in common, aside from language. Questions such as “Why did these two countries decide to become one again?” begin to undermine more basic and unchallenged concepts such as capitalism, socialism, freedom, history, patriotism, and the foundations of nations in general.
“Silver has captured the complex process of German reunification… anyone who wants to better understand why it is so difficult to ‘merge what belongs together’ will want to see this film.”
—Dr. Christoph Schmauch, New Hampshire German Symposium