A director and screenwriter universally considered one of the masters of contemporary German cinema, in 1959 he founded with other young filmmakers a movement for the rebirth of his country’s cinema, which in 1962 gave rise to the famous Oberhausen Manifesto. In 1967 Reitz won the prize for best first feature at the Venice Film Festival with Mahlzeiten (Pastil), which was followed by one of the episodes of Germany in the Fall (1978). directed together with such great auteurs friends as Alexander Kluge and Rainer Werner Fassbinder, a bitter and acute analysis of Germany in the lead years. His penchant for historical and social reflection expanded and was perfected during the 1980s and 1990s in what is his masterpiece, the monumental saga Heimat, which began in 1984 as an 11-episode television series. A generational portrait of balza chiana power, Heimat spans 20th-century German history by depicting a myriad of small, personal stories from the imaginary village of Schabbach, and following the changing German complex concept of “homeland.” The first Heimat is followed by Heimat 2 Chronicle of a Youth (1992) and Heimat 3 Chronicle of an Epochal Change (2004). other giant undertakings that, like the first Heimat, are enthusiastically received by critics and audiences at the Venice Film Festival.