Cologne-born Sabine Howe came to Hamburg straight after her studies – not to immediately look for a job, but first “to experience something”. She just wanted to get out of her comfort zone. Apparently she liked it up north so much that she stayed and at some point started making a living there in film and television. As a director of TV reports with shoots in all possible corners of the world, she is mainly concerned with special people and/or places. Her first feature film ‘Wonderland – From Childhood Dream to Global Success’ offers exactly that – and Howe didn’t even have to leave Hamburg.
The Miniatur Wunderland of the same name is finally located in the Speicherstadt, a huge historic warehouse complex in the port of Hamburg. There are Since 2001, the largest model railway in the world and a huge miniature world have been on display. It is now one of Europe’s most popular tourist attractions, with 1.5 million visitors passing through its rooms every year. ‘Wonderland’ tells the story of this place, which is also the story of the twin brothers Frederik and Gerrit Braun, who conceived and founded the place. Together with around 350 employees, they not only keep the system running, but they also work every day to further expand it. The film is not a simple accumulation of facts, but invites wonder and dreams with beautiful images and many emotions.
FILM START:
Sabine Howe: The latter, although I was already very actively involved in the development of the idea. Producers Benjamin Seikel and Vanessa Nöcker had been thinking about doing something with Miniatur Wunderland for years. Initially it was planned to be a documentary soap series, but fortunately that did not happen. At some point the suggestion came to make a feature film. That’s where I came into the game. It was not yet clear that it would be a cinema project.
FILM START:
Sabine Howe: Yes, a few years ago. I admired and respected the work that went into it, but – I probably shouldn’t say this now, but I will anyway – I wasn’t nearly as excited as my companions. When I realized during pre-production that the Braun twins and their personal backgrounds, as well as the family interactions between the staff, would be the real story, their work began to develop a real fascination for me as well.
FILM START:
Sabine Howe: No, none of that. I found it very refreshing how many people trusted us. They didn’t interfere with anything, made no demands or conditions, they just let us do it. Even after the initial screening, there were no comments or requests for changes from her. Only a few tears of emotion were shed. They apparently liked the result so much that they rented the largest cinema in the city for the regular release and invited all their employees and families for a joint screening.
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Sabine Howe: No not really. We used most of what was available. But we intended from the beginning to tell the story largely visually using CGI animated characters moving within real filmed CinemaScope footage of the miniature world.
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Sabine Howe: None (smiles). For this part of the work we were only there at night. During the day there was normal public traffic that should not be interrupted. In total it was probably 20 nights that my cameraman Till Vielrose in particular spent a lot of time there until everything was in place as we had planned in advance with the detailed storyboards. That is of course a very long period for a documentary and that is why the production company groaned quite a bit. The high-quality equipment that Till uses for this is extremely expensive to rent. But when they saw the images he provided and the animation guys from Paul’s Boutique got to work, everyone agreed that it was more than worth the investment.
FILM START:
Sabine Howe: This wasn’t that easy. To be honest, my producers and I didn’t really know how to shape the musical accompaniment for a long time. We thought about taking a very different approach to the live-action film segments and the animated sequences in this regard and even hired a different composer for this. But somehow that didn’t work. When Robert and Jens came by, the film was almost ready. I asked them to give free rein to their ideas, which turned out to be the right approach as they captured the mood of the images perfectly.
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Sabine Howe: Um, that must have been about two years, which makes “Wonderland” by far my most complex film.
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Sabine Howe: You should never say ‘never’, but I’m not much of a fiction type (laughs). I love working with real people and showing real stories. In most cases, they are much more exciting than anything a screenwriter could come up with.
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Sabine Howe: The follow-up project has not only already been filmed, but can also be seen at Arte in November 2023. The movie is called “The Kung-Fu Nuns of Nepal” and I think it is one of my best. The next thing I’m working on will be about football in a broader sense. But I don’t want to reveal more about it yet – neither in terms of content nor design.
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Sabine Howe: It is important that German documentaries start in cinemas and are also noticed by the public. Maybe I shouldn’t say that, but something has to change: in cinema, documentary makers have the opportunity to tell stories freely without having to follow the dogmas of public television. For example, there is the absurd requirement that every documentary TV report must contain a heroic story. A few years ago someone came up with the idea that this is what the public supposedly wanted to see, and now it’s a mandatory requirement.
A while ago I made a film about a teenage girl in Saudi Arabia who dreamed of becoming the country’s first prima ballerina to dance in public. It is well known how restrictive society there is towards its female members. Therefore, the girl can only learn and practice dancing behind closed doors. As if that wasn’t enough of a challenge, I had to add some kind of competition that I wanted her to win. Without this, in my opinion, annoyingly redundant part, the article could not appear – which is complete nonsense. In that respect, my first feature film was very liberating for me, because I could just tell the story as I saw it. I hope I can do this more often.
You can hear what the collaboration was like for the founders twins in the latest episode of the FILMSTARTS podcast Canvas Love. We have Frederik Braun as a guest there, who tells us, among other things: why Miniatur Wunderland does not have to fear competition from billionaire sheiks:
It is no coincidence that we choose a film for ‘German cinema is [doch] awesome!”, so “Wunderland” is an absolute must in our opinion. This is the conclusion of our detailed criticism: “A visually stunning and moving documentary about a magical place that not only fulfills the makers’ childhood wish, but also invites everyone who visits the place (in real life or in the cinema) to dream.”