'Murderer's House' - University of Victoria
'Murderer's House' - University of Victoria
'Murderer's House' - University of Victoria
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authentic documentary footage <strong>of</strong> the destruction and chaos caused by fascism (Kaes 149,<br />
McCormick “Confronting German History,” 206).<br />
At the end <strong>of</strong> the fairy tale segment, Sanders-Brahms‟ uses the image <strong>of</strong> a golden<br />
ring to indicate a „hidden history‟ which has been repressed elsewhere in the narrative <strong>of</strong><br />
the film: the Nazis‟ programme <strong>of</strong> terror and extermination. As discussed in Chapter 3,<br />
poignant postmemories <strong>of</strong> the Holocaust are evoked through the interplay <strong>of</strong> evocative<br />
images <strong>of</strong> a chimney, factory ovens, and train tracks and their appearance in tandem with<br />
narrative elements <strong>of</strong> the fairy tale. In my opinion, Sanders-Brahms underscores the<br />
concept that the fairy tale segment is a repository in her film for Germany‟s repressed<br />
history <strong>of</strong> horror through visually linking this section with an image <strong>of</strong> a gold ring.<br />
Midway through Lene‟s retelling <strong>of</strong> “Der Räuberbräutigam” to her daughter, Lene is<br />
accosted and raped by two American servicemen. After the rape scene, a medium close-<br />
up shot shows Lene and Anna sitting on the connector between two bars <strong>of</strong> a moving<br />
freight train. Lene resumes telling the tale at the point <strong>of</strong> the narrative where at the<br />
wedding banquet the miller‟s daughter reassures her bridegroom that the story she is<br />
recounting is a fiction she dreamed and not actual reality. A close-up shot shows Lene<br />
with one arm around Anna and the other arm holding onto the rail <strong>of</strong> the train. As Lene<br />
clasps the rail in her hand, her wedding band is clearly visible and it gleams in the<br />
sunlight. This prominent image <strong>of</strong> Lene‟s golden ring is shown as she narrates the line<br />
from the tale: “Mein Schatz, das träumte mir nur” (Sanders-Brahms, Film-Erzählung<br />
96). 97 Lene tells the remainder <strong>of</strong> the tale, including the section where the miller‟s<br />
daughter provides indisputable evidence <strong>of</strong> her story in the form <strong>of</strong> the severed finger and<br />
the ring, while the camera pans past Anna‟s face and to Lene and Anna‟s feet, and then to<br />
97 “It was just a dream, my love” (Sanders-Brahms, Film-Erzählung 96).<br />
130