An unusually honest depiction of women’s love for women from 1931, it’s a tale of tender feeling that gives earnest attention to the joys and pains of young adulthood. We join Manuela (Hertha Thiele) as she enrolls at a girls’ boarding school. Her dormitory is overseen by Fräulein von Bernburg (Dorothea Wieck), a teacher by turns disciplinarian and empathetic. When Manuela falls in love with her, she is surprised to realise that her feelings are reciprocated.

In many ways a pioneering film, Mädchen in Uniform nevertheless demonstrates how the cinema of the period often boasted complex and tremendously modern female lead roles, with a sophisticated understanding and depiction of sexuality, gender and desire.

The film is screening on a 16mm print from the ICA Archive.