Cowboys & Communists

...the Germans really got it. It screened in a couple of film festivals in Germany and won an award there, and it screened on ARD, a German channel, which to me was a success as I was able to come a foreign country and tell a story about their culture that they could respond to. It’s quite good being an outsider in those situations because you’re allowed to go in there and ask dumb questions, and especially in a situation like that where you’ve got an East/West thing, and you’re not coming from one side or the other...

– Director Jess Feast in a Lumière Reader interview, 14 September 2013

I was convinced that it was good that such an institution existed. I believe every state has to protect itself. For me, the Stasi was a necessary evil.

– Horst Woitalla on the Stasi, the East German secret police

I'm a waitress ... I'm also a filmmaker, and for 18 months while I waitressed at White Trash I shot this film: the story of the battle for this corner, where the lives of a cowboy and a communist collide.

– Director Jess Feast, in the opening minutes of Cowboys and Communists

When I was rudely awoken at three in the morning by the pounding, I took to the barricades right from the beginning, and I was the first to write to the local authorities. I also called the police, so it would be a little quieter.

– Horst Woitalla, who lives above the White Trash Fast Food bar