History Film / Friendship

* RealLifeRelative: The actors playing Tom's parents in the beginning are indeed the parents of the actor playing the role of Tom, Matthias Schweighöfer.

The UsefulNotes/BerlinWall fell and two lifelong friends from East Germany, Veit and Tom, want to travel to San Francisco, the former in order to find his father, whose only life sign since fleeing the GDR is an annual birthday postcard to his son, always postmarked from the same post office in San Francisco. The pair's low budget only gets them a flight to New York and the rest isn't enough for a rail ticket, forcing them into an adventurous road trip across the country, never sure if they'll get to Frisco in time, and always needing to earn money to get there.

* YouFailGeographyForever: Veit says that San Francisco is "the westernmost point of the world..."
** YouFailLogicForever: "...beyond it there's only water, and Asia."

German 2010 movie dealing with a coming-of-age story [[SoWhatDoWeDoNow of politically messed up guys]].

The UsefulNotes/BerlinWall fell and two lifelong friends from East Germany, Veit and Tom, are prone to travel to San Francisco, the former one in order to find his father whose only life sign since his flight out of the GDR is an annual happy birthday postcard always stamped from the same post office in San Francisco.

Their low budget only gets them a flight to New York and the rest doesn't suffice for a rail ticket, ending them up on an adventurous road trip across the country, never sure if they get to Frisco in time, and always in need to earn money to get there.

!!This Film Provides Examples Of:

* AllGermansAreNazis: Default mode of the passport checking policeman at JFK airport.

* YouFailGeographyForever: Veit says that San Francisco were "the westernmost point of the world,..."

* BadassBiker: They meet some in Tennessee and one of them even entrusts them to drive his brother's car back to California.
* BerserkButton: Never tell Veit that your father had been a communist, even if you're a drunk American biker who lost his father in Vietnam!
* BittersweetEnding: So {{Troperiffic}} that it's mere technicalities: [[spoiler:TheReveal in Frisco makes Veit suffer a HeroicBSOD, but the HeterosexualLifePartners reconcile from the LoveTriangle and they see TheAllegedCar crossing Golden Gate.]]
* BlackBossLady: The black police woman arresting Veit and Tom. May perhaps be just a low ranking cop on patrol duty, but can definitely act quite authoritatively.
* ButNotTooForeign: Zoe

* DirtyCommunists: Whenever they try to explain which kind of Germany they come from, they often end up describing themselves like this, often with inconvenient consequences.

* {{Eagleland}}: Both flavors, including

** FlyOverCountry: which they have too cross.

* {{Expy}}: The first hitched driver is a clear embodiment of Creator/JohnKricfalusi and the drawings in his car also clearly resemble ''WesternAnimation/TheRenAndStimpyShow'' cartoons.

* {{Flashback}}: Tom and Veit getting to know each other as schoolchildren and stretching antennas to receive West radio.
* FromACertainPointOfView: Deconstructed. Veit always told Tom that his father died before they met and, when Tom finds out about the postcards somewhere in New York, argues that he said so because he was ''dead to him'' and [[ParentalAbandonment wanted to forget his father after he flew to the West]] and he feared that his real motivation for the journey would make Tom call off his accompaniment. In the end we learn that [[spoiler:his father has in fact been dead all the time, [[AccidentalTruth but Veit couldn't know that]].]]
* [[spoiler:GovermentConspiracy - The real story behind the postcards.]]

* LockedOutOfTheLoop: Veit is a culprit [[spoiler:and a victim]] of this. Veit pulls his certain point of view on Tom when it comes to explaining his father's absence. [[spoiler:And the Stasi pulled their certain point of view on Veit's family]].
* LoveTriangle: A [[TriangRelations type 4]] among Veit (A), Zoe (B) and Tom (C). Veit is so furious about Zoe spending the night with Tom that he drives to Frisco alone and leaves Tom behind at the motel. Tom will later pettily complain about Veit that he could at least have told him which post office in Frisco they were to go.
* LukeIAmYourFather: Discussed. Zoe has to explain her unsavvy East German companions about the Star Wars plot and shows parallels between Luke's quest in Star Wars and Veit's quest in the movie.
* MacGuffin: The birthday postcards to Veit are the pretext for the whole journey. Oh, the Darth Vader helmet and the lightsword in the car trunk also provide for... [[LukeIAmYourFather the explanation above]].
* OnTheMoney: They show quite some creativity in earning money on their trip.
* OverprotectiveDad: Things get awry when the boys flee the house they were dragged off to by some girls in Tennessee when gun crazy daddy gets back home.

* PoliticallyCorrectHistory: Averted. As the movie is playing in 1990, New York City is correctly depicted with the Twin Towers.

* TheReveal: Veit's father [[spoiler:was actually killed at the UsefulNotes/BerlinWall. The birthday postcards were sent by another emigrant who made a deal with the Stasi that they let him go west if he agrees [[GovernmentConspiracy to send ready-written fake letters to numerous abandoned families of killed border crossers]] to hold up a [[LockedOutOfTheLoop masquerade that their killed relatives had made it over there and were just fine]].]]

* STDImmunity: Played with. When Amber (the blonde of the two chicks in Tennessee) refuses to have unprotected sex with him when condoms aren't handy and reasons with HIV awareness, low-brow Tom tries to talk her into it stating that he cannot have HIV/AIDS as he's from the East and that they didn't have it there. [[note]]The major wave may have been mostly halted by the Iron Curtain for some time, but that didn't close detours for the virus. The GDR was completely aware of this and managed it rather well.[[/note]] His proposal to get oral sex instead is rejected with awe.
* StrangerSafety: Sure, Tom and Veit are just two low-brow foreign tourists who are not really prone to harm Zoe who gave them shelter. But the black biker of the gang entrusting two random guys [[WillingSuspensionOfDisbelief the transit of his brother's car through all the US]]?

* VeryLooselyBasedOnATrueStory: Subverted. It's lampshaded as the subtitle is "The first ''Ossis'' (Easterners) in America... based on an almost true story", but the journey really happened and [[WordOfGod the making-of]] even shows interviews with the real-life Tom Zickler whose story the movie is based on.
* WhereEverybodyKnowsYourFlame: Veit and Tom strip as Eastern soldiers at the "Black Mustang" in UsefulNotes/LasVegas to earn money for Tom's dentistry.
* WhyWeAreBummedCommunismFell: the entire reason for the trip.

** Also inverted at the supermarket scene to be in New Mexico:
--> '''Tom:''' Who's supposed to understand us? Have you ever encountered anybody here in America speaking something else but American? Look at that... ''(watching out to local girl)'' yeah, my friend would like to marry you and then just eat and eat like you until he gets just as round and polly! ''(local girl laughs)'' There she laughs!
** This is later subverted to hell with Zoe, a [[ButNotTooForeign half-German girl]] understanding every word of Tom's would-you-go-to-bed-with-me question. She'll later give them shelter and follow them up to UsefulNotes/LasVegas.

* YoureInsane: Tom's parents are very resilient about their journey. His mother just argues "that you even cannot speak English!", while his father says outright that "This is the total crap!"

* HoleInFlag: Time frame of the story.

* EastGermany: Where the two guys come from.

The BerlinWall fell and two lifelong friends from East Germany, Veit and Tom, are prone to travel to San Francisco, the former one in order to find his father whose only life sign since his flight out of the GDR is an annual happy birthday postcard always stamped from the same post office in San Francisco.

* UsefulNotes/BerlinWall: At one point, Veit and Tom have the scheme to earn money by selling fake Berlin Wall debris.

* TheReveal: Veit's father [[spoiler:was actually killed at the BerlinWall. The birthday postcards were sent by another emigrant who made a deal with the Stasi that they let him go west if he agrees [[GovernmentConspiracy to send ready-written fake letters to numerous abandoned families of killed border crossers]] to hold up a [[LockedOutOfTheLoop masquerade that their killed relatives had made it over there and were just fine]].]]

* {{Expy}}: The first hitched driver is a clear embodiment of Creator/JohnKricfalusi and the drawings in his car also clearly resemble RenAndStimpy cartoons.

* PopCulturalOsmosisFailure: Having grown up behind the IronCurtain, Veit and Tom didn't know ''Franchise/StarWars'' before Zoe tells them about it.

* RoadMovie

* WhereEverybodyKnowsYourFlame: Veit and Tom strip as Eastern soldiers at the "Black Mustang" in Las Vegas to earn money for Tom's dentistry.

** This is later subverted to hell with Zoe, a [[ButNotTooForeign half-German girl]] understanding every word of Tom's would-you-go-to-bed-with-me question. She'll later give them shelter and follow them up to Vegas.
** Also featured in the BigShutUp in Vegas.

* FromACertainPointOfView: Deconstructed. Veit always told Tom that his father died before they met and, when Tom finds out about the postcards somewhere in New York, argues that he said so because he was ''dead to him'' and [[ParentalAbandonment wanted to forget his father after he flew to the West]] and he feared that his real motivation for the journey would make Tom call off his accompaniment. In the end we learn that [[spoiler:his father has in fact been dead all the time, but Veit couldn't know that.]]

*** This is later subverted to hell with Zoe, a [[ButNotTooForeign half-German girl]] understanding every word of Tom's would-you-go-to-bed-with-me question. She'll later give them shelter and follow them up to Vegas.

* {{Expy}}: The first hitched driver is a clear embodiment of JohnKricfalusi and the drawings in his car also clearly resemble RenAndStimpy cartoons.

* WhereEverybodyKnowsYourFlame: Veit and Tom strip as Eastern soldiers at the "Black Mustang" in Las Vegas to earn money for Tom's dentistry.
* YoureInsane: Tom's parents are very resilient about their journey. His mother just argues "that you even cannot speak English!", while his father says outright that "This is the total crap!"

* TheAllegedCar: Veit fantasizes about watching a Trabant driving down the Golden Gate Bridge [[spoiler:and the fantasy becomes reality in the end.]]

* YouFailGeographyForever: Veit says that San Francisco were "the westernmost point of the world,..."
** YouFailLogicForever: "...beyond it there's only water, and Asia."

* GermansLoveDavidHasselhoff:
---> "Autumn 1989. All the world looks at the GDR. ''[[LampshadeHanging And David Hasselhoff brings the wall to fall.]]''"

* CrowningMomentOfAwesome
** How they brought the car to the biker's brother back in the end of the movie.
** How they earn money on the trip, stripping, selling false Berlin Wall parts...

** SanFrancisco: which is their final destination.

* BlackBossLady: The black police woman arresting Veit and Tom may perhaps be just a low ranking cop on patrol duty, but can definitely act quite authoritatively.

The Berlin Wall fell and two lifelong friends from East Germany, Veit and Tom, are prone to travel to San Francisco, the former one in order to find his father whose only life sign since his flight out of the GDR is an annual happy birthday postcard always stamped from the same post office in San Francisco.

* STDImmunity: Played with. When Amber (the blonde of the two chicks in Tennessee) refuses to have unprotected sex with him when condoms aren't handy and reasons with HIV awareness, low-brow Tom tries to talk her into it stating that he cannot have HIV/AIDS as he's from the East and that they didn't have it there. [[hottip:*:The major wave may have been mostly halted by the Iron Curtain for some time, but that didn't close detours for the virus. The GDR was completely aware of this and managed it rather well.]] His proposal to get oral sex instead is rejected with awe.

* WhyWereBummedCommunismFell: the entire reason for the trip.

* AllGermansAreNazis - Default mode of the passport checking policeman at JFK airport.
* TheAllegedCar - Veit fantasizes about watching a Trabant driving down the Golden Gate Bridge [[spoiler:and the fantasy becomes reality in the end.]]

* BadassBiker - They meet some in Tennessee and one of them even entrusts them to drive his brother's car back to California.
* BerserkButton - Never tell Veit that your father had been a communist, even if you're a drunk American biker who lost his father in Vietnam!
* BittersweetEnding - So {{Troperiffic}} that it's mere technicalities: [[spoiler:TheReveal in Frisco makes Veit suffer a HeroicBSOD, but the HeterosexualLifePartners reconcile from the LoveTriangle and they see TheAllegedCar crossing Golden Gate.]]
* ButNotTooForeign - Zoe
* ClusterFBomb - Invoked and discussed at a diner in Tennessee.
* CoolCar - Brought back to you from your biking brother at the other end of the country by entrusting it to two foreign road trippers.

* [[spoiler:DeadAllAlong - Veit's father]]
* DirtyCommunists - Whenever they try to explain which kind of Germany they come from, they often end up describing themselves like this, often with inconvenient consequences.
* TheDitz - Tom, at times.
* DrugsAreBad - Or whatever. Is there a trope out there to describe a car driver smoking weed from an apple bong?
* {{Eagleland}} - Both flavors, including
** BigAppleSauce - where they land at first.
** FlyOverCountry - which they have too cross.
** VivaLasVegas - where much of the real action happens.
** SanFrancisco - which is their final destination.
* EastGermany - Where the two guys come from.
* {{Expy}} - The first hitched driver is a clear embodiment of JohnKricfalusi and the drawings in his car also clearly resemble RenAndStimpy cartoons.

* {{Flashback}} - Tom and Veit getting to know each other as schoolchildren and stretching antennas to receive West radio.
* FromACertainPointOfView - Deconstructed. Veit always told Tom that his father died before they met and, when Tom finds out about the postcards somewhere in New York, argues that he said so because he was ''dead to him'' and [[ParentalAbandonment wanted to forget his father after he flew to the West]] and he feared that his real motivation for the journey would make Tom call off his accompaniment. In the end we learn that [[spoiler:his father has in fact been dead all the time, but Veit couldn't know that.]]
* GermansLoveDavidHasselhoff -

* HeroicBSOD - Veit after the revelation.
* HeterosexualLifePartners - After all, the movie is also about [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin true friendship!]]

* HoleInFlag - Time frame of the story.
* LockedOutOfTheLoop - Veit is a culprit [[spoiler:and a victim]] of this. Veit pulls his certain point of view on Tom when it comes to explaining his father's absence. [[spoiler:And the Stasi pulled their certain point of view on Veit's family]].
* LoveTriangle - A [[TriangRelations type 4]] among Veit (A), Zoe (B) and Tom (C). Veit is so furious about Zoe spending the night with Tom that he drives to Frisco alone and leaves Tom behind at the motel. Tom will later pettily complain about Veit that he could at least have told him which post office in Frisco they were to go.
* LukeIAmYourFather - Discussed. Zoe has to explain her unsavvy East German companions about the Star Wars plot and shows parallels between Luke's quest in Star Wars and Veit's quest in the movie.
* MacGuffin - The birthday postcards to Veit are the pretext for the whole journey. Oh, the Darth Vader helmet and the lightsword in the car trunk also provide for... [[LukeIAmYourFather the explanation above]].
* OnTheMoney - They show quite some creativity in earning money on their trip.
* OverprotectiveDad - Things get awry when the boys flee the house they were dragged off to by some girls in Tennessee when gun crazy daddy gets back home.
* ParentalAbandonment - Veit's father.
* PoliticallyCorrectHistory - Averted. As the movie is playing in 1990, New York City is correctly depicted with the Twin Towers.
* RealLifeRelative - The actors playing Tom's parents in the beginning are indeed the parents of the actor playing the role of Tom, Matthias Schweighöfer.
* RedOniBlueOni - Tom is red, Veit is blue.
* TheReveal - Veit's father [[spoiler:was actually killed at the BerlinWall. The birthday postcards were sent by another emigrant who made a deal with the Stasi that they let him go west if he agrees [[GovernmentConspiracy to send ready-written fake letters to numerous abandoned families of killed border crossers]] to hold up a [[LockedOutOfTheLoop masquerade that their killed relatives had made it over there and were just fine]].]]

* STDImmunity - Played with. When Amber (the blonde of the two chicks in Tennessee) refuses to have unprotected sex with him when condoms aren't handy and reasons with HIV awareness, low-brow Tom tries to talk her into it stating that he cannot have HIV/AIDS as he's from the East and that they didn't have it there. [[hottip:*:The major wave may have been mostly halted by the Iron Curtain for some time, but that didn't close detours for the virus. The GDR was completely aware of this and managed it rather well.]] His proposal to get oral sex instead is rejected with awe.
* StrangerSafety - Sure, Tom and Veit are just two low-brow foreign tourists who are not really prone to harm Zoe who gave them shelter. But the black biker of the gang entrusting two random guys [[WillingSuspensionOfDisbelief the transit of his brother's car through all the US]]?

* VeryLooselyBasedOnATrueStory - Subverted. It's lampshaded as the subtitle is "The first ''Ossis'' (Easterners) in America... based on an almost true story", but the journey really happened and [[WordOfGod the making-of]] even shows interviews with the real-life Tom Zickler whose story the movie is based on.
* WhyWereBummedCommunismFell - the entire reason for the trip.
* WhereEverybodyKnowsYourFlame - Veit and Tom strip as Eastern soldiers at the "Black Mustang" in Las Vegas to earn money for Tom's dentistry.
* YoureInsane - Tom's parents are very resilient about their journey. His mother just argues "that you even cannot speak English!", while his father says outright that "This is the total crap!"
* YouFailGeographyForever - Veit says that San Francisco were "the westernmost point of the world,..."
** YouFailLogicForever - "...beyond it there's only water, and Asia."
* YouNoTakeCandle - Played straight first, but they get better.

[[redirect:{{Ptitlepu1ifnjm}}]]

If you're looking for the 2010 German feature film, that's where you go: [[{{Ptitlepu1ifnjm}} Friendship!]]

German 2010 movie dealing with a coming-of-age story of politically messed up guys.

The Berlin Wall fell and two lifelong friends from East Germany, Veit and Tom, are prone to travel to San Francisco, the former one in order to find his father whose only life sign since his flight out of the GDR is an annual happy birthday postcard always stamped from the same post office in San Francisco.

Their low budget only gets them a flight to New York and the rest doesn't suffice for a rail ticket, ending them up on an adventurous road trip across the country, never sure if they get to Frisco in time, and always in need to earn money to get there.

!!This Film Provides Examples Of:
*AllGermansAreNazis - Default mode of the passport checking policeman at JFK airport.
*TheAllegedCar - Veit fantasizes about seeing a Trabant driving down the Golden Gate Bridge [[spoiler:and the fantasy becomes reality in the end.]]
*ArsonMurderAndJaywalking
---> '''Veit:''' Dancing? OK. Undressing myself, sure. At a gay strip club, I don't mind. But not to the anthem of the GDR!
*BadassBiker - They meet some in Tennessee and one of them even entrusts them to drive his brother's car back to California.
*ButNotTooForeign - Zoey
*CallARabbitASmeerp - Tom calls the supermarket a ''Kaufhalle'' (purchase hall) and refers to condoms as ''Mondos'' (brand name), but you know, [[YouShouldKnowThisAlready they are from the East, right?]]
*CrowningMomentOfAwesome
**How they brought the car to the biker's brother back in the end of the movie.
**How they earn money on the trip, stripping, selling false Berlin Wall parts...
*DirtyCommunists - Whenever they try to explain which kind of Germany they come from, they often end up describing themselves like this, often with inconvenient consequences.
*TheDitz - Tom, at times.
*TitleDrop
*{{Eagleland}} - Both flavors.
*FishOutOfWater - Oh, so much!
*GRatedDrug - Or not? Getting high on smoking apples? Using an apple as a bong? Wrong trope?
*HeroicBSOD - Veit after the reveal.
*HeterosexualLifePartners - After all, the movie is also about [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin true friendship!]]
---> '''Tom:''' From then on, Veit became my twenty-four!
*LockedOutOfTheLoop - See the reveal.
*OnTheMoney - They show quite some creativity in earning money on their trip.
*OverprotectiveDad - Things get awry when the boys flee the house they were dragged off to by some girls in Tennessee when gun crazy daddy gets back home.
*PoliticallyCorrectHistory - Averted. As the movie is playing in 1990, New York City is correctly depicted with the Twin Towers.
*TheReveal - The birthday postcards for Veit [[spoiler:were written and sent by a proxy engaged by the Stasi to hide the fact that the father didn't get ransomed to the West but was actually killed when crossing the Iron Curtain-]]
*RoadMovie
*STDImmunity - Played with. When Tom doesn't get sex from the blonde in Tennessee because there are no condoms ready and she reasons with the risk of HIV, he tries to talk her into unprotected sex in vain nonetheless by stating that he's from East Germany and [[DidNotDoTheResearch that they didn't have AIDS there]].[[hottip:*:HIV reached the GDR first on detours via African contract workers, but the advent was before the fall of the wall. Even without knowing this, Tom's excuse is very lousy.]] His proposal to get oral sex instead is rejected with awe.
**Remind that this is just one of many times when Tom [[TheDitz acts in a low-brow manner]].
*[[{{ptitle1d213erd}} Why We're Bummed Communism Fell]] - the entire reason for the trip
*VeryLooselyBasedOnATrueStory - Lampshaded as the subtitle is "The first ''Ossis'' (Easterners) in America... based on an almost true story".
*WhereEverybodyKnowsYourFlame - Veit and Tom strip as Eastern soldiers at the "Black Mustang" in Las Vegas to earn money for Tom's dentistry.
*YouNoTakeCandle - Played straight, but they get better.
**Also inverted at the supermarket scene to be in New Mexico:
---> '''Tom:''' Who's supposed to understand us? Have you ever encountered anybody here in America speaking something else but American? Look at that... ''(watching out to local girl)'' yeah, my friend would like to marry you and then just eat and eat like you until he gets just as round and polly! ''(local girl laughs)'' There she laughs!
***This is later subverted to hell with Zoey, a [[ButNotTooForeign half-German girl]] understanding every word of Tom's would-you-go-to-bed-with-me question. [[spoiler:She'll later give them shelter and follow them up to Vegas.]]

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