Vision (2009 film)
2009 film by Margarethe von Trotta
Vision (German: Vision - Aus dem Leben der Hildegard von Bingen; English: Vision – From the Life of Hildegard von Bingen) is a 2009 German film directed by Margarethe von Trotta.
Plot
In Vision, New German Cinema auteur Margarethe von Trotta (Marianne and Julianne, Rosa Luxemburg and Rosentrasse) tells the story of Hildegard of Bingen, the famed 12th century Benedictine nun, Christian mystic, composer, philosopher, playwright, physician, poet, naturalist, scientist and ecological activist. Hildegard was a multi-talented, highly intelligent woman who had to work within the narrow social roles allowed for women at the time.
Cast
Barbara Sukowa as Hildegard of Bingen
Stella Holzapfel as Hildegard as a Child
Heino Ferch as Brother Volmar
Hannah Herzsprung as Sister Richardis
Mareile Blendi as Countess Jutta von Sponheim
Sunnyi Melles as Marchioness Richardis von Stade
Alexander Held as Abbot Kuno
Lena Stolze as Sister Jutta
Paula Kalenberg as Sister Clara
Annemarie Düringer as Abbess Tengwich
Devid Striesow as Emperor Frederick Barbarossa
Production
Integrally involved with the 1970s Women’s Movement, filmmaker Margarethe von Trotta has always been drawn to women whose story has been marginalized over time. Von Trotta and others re-found Hildegard von Bingen in their search for historically forgotten (or misremembered) women. While writing the screenplay for her 1983 film Rosa Luxemburg, von Trotta’s interest in Hildegard re-emerged and she wondered whether Hildegard’s life would be good material for a movie. After writing a few scenes, von Trotta felt the film had a powerful message and potential resonance but didn’t feel she could find a producer ready to make the movie. Thus, von Trotta shelved the idea until it came to cinematic fruition recently.
The film reunites von Trotta with Barbara Sukowa (Zentropa, Berlin Alexanderplatz). Sukowa portrays Hildegard’s fierce determination to expand the responsibilities of women within the Benedictine order, as she fends off outrage from the Church over the visions she claims to receive from God.
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Object files, edition statements, performance records and contemporary criticism preserve different stages of the work’s history. The source revision retrieved here is dated May 21, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q329108. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2009 and 1983.
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This entry incorporates text from “Vision (2009 film)” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.