My Life as a Terrorist: The Story of Hans-Joachim Klein

In 1975, Hans-Joachim Klein, a militant German social activist from a severely dysfunctional blue collar family, conspired with the infamous terrorist Ilich Ramírez Sánchez (better known as Carlos the Jackal) to kidnap 42 OPEC employees and ministers from Vienna. Klein participated in support of the Palestinian cause; unbeknownst to him, Sánchez and the others had a hidden motive. As a result of the conspiracy, three OPEC officials died, and though Klein himself emerged with bloodless hands, he instantly regretted his activities and went underground for decades, as an informant on global terrorist networks. Sánchez put a death threat on Klein's head, but Klein became an unofficial hero to such activists as Sartre, Debray and others, prior to his French arraignment in 1998. At that trial, a number of Klein's former collaborators - by then well-respected politicians in France, such as Daniel Cohn-Bendit - joined forces to incriminate him. Now, Dutch television vet Alexander Oey enables Klein to tell his story from the beginning, disturbing details intact, in the beguiling documentary "My Life as a Terrorist : The Story of Hans-Joachim Klein". Oey and Klein team up, cameras-in-tow, and undertake a cross-continental road trip. Klein tells his story narratively, which Oey frames via glimpses of the former terrorist's old European haunts, rich with associations and memories for Klein. The director also incorporates startling archival footage from the period of Klein's criminal activities.