On a talkshow, actor and German TV ikon Joachim Fuchsberger recalls how the games for his show "Nur nicht nervös werden" (Don't Get Nervous), first broadcast on West German TV in 1960, were developed along the lines of American psychiatry. Asked "So how many crazy people watched you?", he responded: "A whole crazy, psychologically disturbed nation". Why were the Germans or to be more precise, the West Germans, a psychologically disturbed nation at that time? This is a film about cheerful and serious games, therapies for re-education and self-imposed re-education, as well as the history of the idea of permanent revolution. Those appearing include directors and producers of gameshows, psychiatrists, anthropologists, and the diversely paranoid.
Lutz Dammbeck was born in 1948 in Leipzig (East Germany). He studied graphic design. In the 1970s he started out as a painter and graphic designer while discovering animated film as a means of experimenting and expression. Until 1986 he produced his films in East Germany for production company DEFA. In 1986 he emigrated to West Germany in order to continue with his Herakles-project that was rejected by East German authorities. This project included films, installations, paintings and performances. It was pursued until 2002. Since the 1990ies Dammbeck turned his focus from animated shorts to documentaries about the art world.
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