The Einstein of Sex

The Einstein of Sex: Life and Work of Dr. M. Hirschfeld (German: Der Einstein des Sex) is a 1999 German film directed by Rosa von Praunheim. The plot follows the life of the Jewish doctor Magnus Hirschfeld who was a sexologist and gay socialist. In 1897, Hirschfeld founded the first political gay group in history. In the film three of Hirschfeld's closest friends are portrayed: Baron Hermann von Teschenberg, Karl Giese and Dorchen (a transsexual). They establish the first Institut für Sexualwissenschaft in Berlin in 1919. They try to keep the institute open during the rise of the Third Reich in the early 1930s. Although inspired by Hirschfeld's life, the film is a work of fiction containing invented characters and incidents and attributing motives and sentiments to Hirschfeld and others on the basis of little or no historical evidence. Hirschfeld biographer Ralf Dose notes, for instance, that "the figure of 'Dorchen' in Rosa von Praunheim's film The Einstein of Sex is complete fiction."