Meragel Ha-Shampaniya

original title:
Meragel Ha-Shampaniya
other titles:
(Der Champagner-Spion), The Champagne Spy
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original length:
88 min. , color
premiere:
D: 11 February 2007
based on:
Wolfgang Lotz. Fünftausend für Lotz. Der Bericht des israelischen Meisterspions Wolfgang Lotz. Frankfurt/M.: Govert Krüger Stahlberg Verl., 1973.
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plot synopsis:
In the 1930s Ze'ev Gur Arie escaped from Germany to Israel. In 1962, masked as German businessman, he is sent to Egypt, to spy on a rocket programme against Israel. Gur Arie adopts his new identity as ex-Nazi and millionair Wolfgang Lotz completely. His Israelian wife and their son are resettled to Paris, meanwhile Arie -alias Lotz- leads a life in luxury in Cairo. Every six months he travels to Paris to give his account to the Mossad and see his family. On one of his journeys he meets 29-year-old Waltraud Neumann in Munich, they fall in love in marry secretely. With his German wife his camouflage is perfect. Waltraud gets to know about his real identity years later.
He really manages to get the information on the rocket programme. But his camouflage is discovered and he is sent to prison. He admits being an Israelian spy, but he does not reveal his Jewish identity.
After years in prison Lotz, or rather Arie, returns to Israel but not to his family. Finally he moves to Germany where he dies impoverished in Munich in 1993.
literature:
Thomas Gordon. Die Mossad-Akte: Israels Geheimdienst und seine Schattenkrieger. München: Droemer Knaur, 2001.
remarks:
Nominated best documentary in 2007 by the Israelian Film Academy.

Homepage: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolfgang_Lotz_(Geheimagent)
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