'Murderer's House' - University of Victoria

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Chapter 1: A (De)Politicized West German Cinema: The Heimatfilm and the Kriegsfilm After the end of the Second World War there was a desire to forget the Nazi past and during the 1950s it tended not to be a topic for public discussion. As (West) German filmmaker Margarethe von Trotta observed in 1984, “We felt that there was a past of which we were guilty as a nation but we weren‟t told about in school. If you asked questions, you didn‟t get answers” (quoted in Bergmann 47). In the late 1940s and the 1950s West Germany focused on rebuilding its economy. With help from the Marshall Plan and the currency reform of 1948, the West German economy soon flourished. Many West Germans blinded themselves to the continuities with the “Third Reich” and thought that the past of their country could now be forgotten. During the Adenauer and Erhard era, a remarkable change of mood took place in West German cinema. The first films made after 1945 were the so-called Trümmerfilme (rubble films) 6 that thematized the country‟s wartime devastation and political defeat through their remarkable stories, characters, and locations (Hake 91). However, the realism of the Trümmerfilme soon became less popular as German audiences started to demand films that corresponded more to their fantasies than to mundane social realities. The Trümmerfilme disappeared from the screen after 1948 (Fehrenbach 149). Throughout the 1950s, West German cinema focused less on taking a critical look at the recent German past and more on making pleasing entertainment films for a domestic 6 Examples of Trümmerfilme include Wolfgang Staudte‟s Die Mörder sind unter uns (The Murderers Are among Us, 1946), Harald Braun‟s Zwischen gestern und morgen (Between Yesterday and Tomorrow, 1947), Josef von Báky‟s Und über uns der Himmel (And above Us the Sky, 1947), Helmut Käutner‟s films In jenen Tagen (In Those Days, 1947) and Der Apfel ist ab (The Apple Fell, 1948) and Robert A. Stemmle‟s Berliner Ballade (Berliner Ballad, 1948). In this thesis, all the primary works that I list but do not discuss in detail are not included in the “Works Cited.” In contrast, all the secondary works that I list are included in the “Works Cited.” 9
audience. One of the most popular genres of this period was the escapist Heimatfilm, 7 which depicted “the unproblematic activities of simple country folk in settings of natural magnificence and pastoral bliss” (Phillips xiii). These morally simplistic films played out in idyllic rural settings were very popular with audiences of the 1950s as they perfectly complemented many West Germans‟ desire to forget the Nazi past as quickly as possible. The nostalgic and sentimental Heimatfilme not only acted as a refuge from the chaos of post-war German reality, but also tried to convey a new sense of home and belonging to millions of refugees and exiles who had been displaced from their original homelands (Kaes 15). Another popular cinematic genre of the 1950s was the war film (Kriegsfilm). The war films of the Adenauer era discouraged historical analysis and moral introspection through their naturalistic style and through their presentation of Germans as the victims of history. Kriegsfilme such as Helmut Käutner‟s Des Teufels General (The Devil’s General, 1954) and Paul May‟s 08/15 (1954-5) present an exculpatory version of Vergangenheitsbewältigung because they tend to portray German soldiers as noble victims of the tyrannical Nazi regime and do not address or investigate the soldiers‟ complicity with this regime (Furhammar and Isaksson 221). Even films critical of war such as Bernhard Wicki‟s immensely successful film, Die Brücke (The Bridge, 1959), retain a political ambivalence. Set in 1945, this pacifist war drama depicts the tragic story of seven German child-soldiers who are senselessly killed while defending an 7 Examples of Heimatfilme are: Hans Deppe‟s Schwarzwaldmädel (Black Forest Girl, 1950), and Grün ist die Heide (Green is the Heather, 1951), Hans Wolff‟s Am Brunnen vor dem Tore (At the Well Outside the Gate, 1952), Hans Deppe‟s Wenn der weisse Flieder wieder blüht (When the White Lilacs Bloom Again, 1953), Harald Reinl‟s Die Fischerin vom Bodensee (The Fisherwoman from Lake Constance, 1956), and Wolfgang Liebener‟s films Die Trapp-Familie (The Trapp Family, 1956) and Die Trapp-Familie in Amerika (The Trapp Family in America, 1958). 10
Page 1 and 2: Storytelling and Survival in the
Page 3 and 4: Supervisory Committee Dr. Helga Tho
Page 5 and 6: 3.1 Intergenerational Dialogue in D
Page 7 and 8: I would like to dedicate this thesi
Page 9 and 10: Sanders-Brahms describes a phenomen
Page 11 and 12: that Sanders-Brahms uses the fairy
Page 13 and 14: early 1980s by a wave of historical
Page 15: Deutschland, bleiche Mutter. Moreov
Page 19 and 20: 1.1 The Oberhausen Manifesto and Ne
Page 21 and 22: audiences. This film movement of th
Page 23 and 24: e beholden to him, for only through
Page 25 and 26: political events that took place in
Page 27 and 28: Verdrängten eigentlich gar nicht g
Page 29 and 30: (Deutschland im Herbst n. pag.). 14
Page 31 and 32: in drei Jahrzehnten Nachkriegsgesch
Page 33 and 34: impact West Germans in such a drama
Page 35 and 36: If German films are to make use of
Page 37 and 38: 1.4 Deutschland, bleiche Mutter as
Page 39 and 40: story must be hidden as much as pos
Page 41 and 42: Chapter 2: New Subjectivity and Wes
Page 43 and 44: Reich” opposes fascism, but who e
Page 45 and 46: direct and personal confrontation w
Page 47 and 48: context has only become part of the
Page 49 and 50: perpetrators are defined predominan
Page 51 and 52: Thus, Sanders-Brahms creates a coun
Page 53 and 54: In the birth sequence, Sanders-Brah
Page 55 and 56: ombs fall downward from the upper r
Page 57 and 58: narrator‟s sadness at the destruc
Page 59 and 60: essentialize men or women‟s exper
Page 61 and 62: image visually separates the runnin
Page 63 and 64: emotional connection between mother
Page 65 and 66: endurance and stoic acceptance of b
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texture which is both social and hi
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ombings terrorized civilian populat
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y war. A final interesting point of
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Maikäfer flieg. dein Vater ist im
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Why does Lene sing the Maikäferlie
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Beginning with the so-called recons
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elationship. Through its subjective
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a series of forty-one volumes publi
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3.1 Intergenerational Dialogue in D
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geworden” (Brecht, Werke 253). 55
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Eure Unarmung kann ich mir nicht de
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3.2 Retelling a Grimm Tale: Voice a
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and springs into the lap of the hid
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apes were collectively perceived as
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3.4 “Der Räuberbräutigam,” Po
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with its ironic “Arbeit macht fre
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Further, the absence or presence at
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can imagine the chimney blowing out
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Chapter 4: Three Images of Woman in
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Moreover she demonstrates insight a
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victimization of another through he
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in an effort to help, Lene quickly
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Liebe, Ehe, ein Kind” (Sanders-Br
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knowingly or unknowingly, to make p
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passively complicit in the crimes o
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Contrastingly, in the middle and la
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traditional gender roles and emphas
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The old woman‟s constructive fema
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the severed finger at the tale‟s
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and calm camera movements. In contr
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The dentist and Hans completely ove
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4.4 Summarizing Remarks Sanders-Bra
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Chapter 5: Conclusion Mother’s Vo
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forced back into the oppressive dep
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daughter in what becomes an interge
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authentic documentary footage of th
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evocation of the Holocaust through
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Brahms articulates represents an ac
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H.S.-B.: Well, one answer to this q
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H.S.-B.: There is a very small baby
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only when you forget about scientif
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R.R.: So an example of that would b
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political context of the fictional
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was a wonderful image, like the May
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H.S.-B.: Yes, you‟re right, it‟
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R.R.: Some critics say that she is
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They just appeared during shooting.
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film represent the woman who respon
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R.R.: So, by telling your story, yo
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H.S.-B.: This happened to my mother
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irritated the critics terribly. It
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opening up, but actually, the strug
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---. Brecht on Theater. Ed. and Tra
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Herbst, Philip. Wimmin, Wimps and W
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---. “Gender, Film, and German Hi
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Sander, Helke and Barbara Johr. Eds
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'Murderer's House' - University of Victoria

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