'Murderer's House' - University of Victoria

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work, Sanders-Brahms draws the viewer into a story, which is above all an intergenerational dialogue. A second aspect of the interaction across the generations in Deutschland, bleiche Mutter is Sanders-Brahms‟ use of the cinematic voice-over technique. In creating a fictionalized account of her mother‟s and to some extent her own personal experiences of the war and post-war period, the director does not attempt to create an illusion of objective history. While she constructs the plot of her filmic narrative around her mother‟s life, she emphasizes her own authority in the cinematic retelling of her mother‟s story through the use of an off-screen voice-over. A disembodied female voice, Sanders- Brahms‟ own voice, comments on the images of the film and thus lends a discursive quality to this work of memory. From the outset of the film, the filmmaker foregrounds her role in the construction of the film‟s meaning by identifying her parents and by establishing herself as the narrator of their story. The director thus emphasizes her autobiographical perspective on the events being played out in the film. As Kosta explains, “The narrator is the author as well as the speaking subject; she narrates her mother‟s past. The commentary interprets the image and establishes the autobiographical viewpoint in relation to the image” (135). The voice-over not only serves to inscribe the author within the text, but it also works as a distanciation technique that prevents the audience from unmediated identification with the film‟s illusion of reality. One of most striking examples where Sanders-Brahms uses the voice-over to foreground her authorial subjectivity and to alienate the viewer from the on-screen action takes place when the newly married Hans and Lene embrace in their home. As the newlyweds tenderly undress one other, the off-screen voice interrupts the intimacy on the screen, stating: 79
Eure Unarmung kann ich mir nicht denken. Wie deine und deine Haut sich berührt, kann ich nicht denken. Ihr seid meine Eltern. Zwischen euch bin ich. Ich habe nicht geheiratet. Das habe ich an euch verlernt. (Sanders- Brahms, Film-Erzählung 112) 57 The voice-over from the perspective of the adult narrator hampers the viewer from enjoying the romance and innocence of the scene. By telling the audience that she decided not to marry because of her parents‟ marriage, the narrator distances the viewer by suggesting that the happy, amorous couple they see on screen will not continue to be happy and in love. Through the voice-over the filmmaker also exposes her role in constructing the discourse by revealing her reasons for filming the scene as she does and for cutting it after her parents begin to undress each other (McCormick, Politics 197). She uses the voice-over to foreground her subjectivity in the creation of the fiction and to bring the past into relationship with the present. Thus her strategic use of voice-over opens up a dialogue between the past and present and between the generations, especially between mother and daughter. A third way in which Sanders-Brahms establishes communication between generations is by having her own daughter, Anna Sanders-Brahms, play a role in the film. The character of Anna, who represents the filmmaker as a child in the story, is played at one point by Anna Sanders-Brahms, Helma Sanders-Brahms‟ daughter. When I asked Sanders-Brahms during our personal interview which actress playing the character of Anna in the film was her own child, she replied that her daughter was the toddler "with her hair sticking out [on end]" (Reed 138). By using her daughter to represent her own part in her fictional retelling of her mother‟s story, Sanders-Brahms doubly emphasizes 57 “I can‟t imagine your embrace. I can‟t imagine how your skin and yours touch each other. You are my parents. I am between you. I haven‟t gotten married. I unlearned that from you” (Sanders-Brahms, Film- Erzählung 112). 80
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Storytelling and Survival in the
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Supervisory Committee Dr. Helga Tho
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3.1 Intergenerational Dialogue in D
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I would like to dedicate this thesi
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Sanders-Brahms describes a phenomen
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that Sanders-Brahms uses the fairy
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early 1980s by a wave of historical
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Deutschland, bleiche Mutter. Moreov
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audience. One of the most popular g
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1.1 The Oberhausen Manifesto and Ne
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audiences. This film movement of th
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e beholden to him, for only through
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political events that took place in
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Verdrängten eigentlich gar nicht g
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(Deutschland im Herbst n. pag.). 14
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in drei Jahrzehnten Nachkriegsgesch
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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
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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
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Page 63 and 64: emotional connection between mother
Page 65 and 66: endurance and stoic acceptance of b
Page 67 and 68: texture which is both social and hi
Page 69 and 70: ombings terrorized civilian populat
Page 71 and 72: y war. A final interesting point of
Page 73 and 74: Maikäfer flieg. dein Vater ist im
Page 75 and 76: Why does Lene sing the Maikäferlie
Page 77 and 78: Beginning with the so-called recons
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Page 81 and 82: a series of forty-one volumes publi
Page 83 and 84: 3.1 Intergenerational Dialogue in D
Page 85: geworden” (Brecht, Werke 253). 55
Page 89 and 90: 3.2 Retelling a Grimm Tale: Voice a
Page 91 and 92: and springs into the lap of the hid
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Page 95 and 96: 3.4 “Der Räuberbräutigam,” Po
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Page 99 and 100: Further, the absence or presence at
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Page 103 and 104: Chapter 4: Three Images of Woman in
Page 105 and 106: Moreover she demonstrates insight a
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Page 109 and 110: in an effort to help, Lene quickly
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Page 117 and 118: Contrastingly, in the middle and la
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Page 129 and 130: 4.4 Summarizing Remarks Sanders-Bra
Page 131 and 132: Chapter 5: Conclusion Mother’s Vo
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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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