| Toyland | |
|---|---|
| Directed by | Jochen Alexander Freydank |
| Produced by | Corona Bellin Jochen Alexander Freydank Christoph Nicolaisen David C. Bunners |
| Written by | Johann A. Bunners Jochen Alexander Freydank |
| Starring | Julia Jäger Cedric Eich Tamay Bulut Öztavan Torsten Michaelis Claudia Hübschmann David C. Bunners Gregor Weber Jürgen Trott Klaus-Jürgen Steinmann Heike W. Reichenwallner Matthias Paul |
| Music by | Ingo Ludwig Frenzel |
| Cinematography | Christoph Nicolaisen |
| Editing by | Anna Kappelmann |
| Studio | Mephistofilm |
| Release date(s) | 2007 |
| Running time | 14 minutes |
| Country | Germany |
| Language | German |
| Budget | 30,000 Euro |
Toyland (German: Spielzeugland) is a German 2007 short film directed, co-written and co-produced by Jochen Alexander Freydank. It won the 2009 Academy Award for Best Live Action Short Film.
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The film is set in Nazi Germany in 1942. An Aryan family, the Meissners, and a Jewish family, the Silbersteins, are neighbors and friends. The respective sons in each family, Heinrich Meissner and David Silberstein, discreetly take piano lessons together. The deportation of the Silbersteins to a concentration camp is imminent, and when Heinrich asks why they may have to go soon, Frau Meissner does not tell Heinrich the truth. She instead invents a story that the Silbersteins will go to a new place called "Toyland". Heinrich says that when the Silbersteins go, he wants to go with them, so that he can still be with his friend David, which terrifies Frau Meissner.
After the Silbersteins are taken away for deportation, Heinrich is found missing from his room one morning. Marianne Meissner begins to search for Heinrich. She encounters ridicule from Gestapo officers after she explains her situation, because they think that she is Jewish. However, after she shows her papers that prove that she is Aryan, they accept her story about Heinrich and assist in searching for him. The search continues until the last moment before the train with the Silbersteins on it must leave.
According to Freydank, it took two years to secure financing for the production, whose costs totaled 30,000€. The actors and production crew initially received no salary. Starting on 22 January 2007, the film was shot in 5 days in and around the Berlin area. Exactly one year later, on 22 January 2008, the film received its German premiere at the Saarbrücken "Film Festival Max Ophüls Preis". The nominations of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences of the 2008 short subjects were announced on 22 January 2009, with Spielzeugland on the list. On 22 February 2009, Spielzeugland received its Oscar for Best Short Subject (Live Action).
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