Paul Cooke, Chris Homewood, eds.. New Directions in German Cinema. London: I.B. Tauris, 2011. xii + 308 pp. $29.50, paper, ISBN 978-1-84885-907-4.

Reviewed by Berna Gueneli

Published on H-German (September, 2013)

Commissioned by Shannon Nagy

A decade after Eric Rentschler referred to address thematic, aesthetic, and economic 's 1990s star-driven mainstream cinema achievements of contemporary German cinema. with his now iconic phrase "cinema of consensus," Acknowledging Rentschler's concerns, the authors Paul Cooke and Chris Homewood's anthology New invite the reader to see the diversity in German Directions in German Cinema undertakes a schol‐ flmic productions in the new millennium. While arly journey to discuss and reevaluate contempo‐ the anthology ofers discussions of flms that rary German flmmaking.[1] Although could easily be categorized as "updated consensus Rentschler's almost cynical polemic hit a nerve at flms" with a global appeal today (p. 4), it also pro‐ the time, his assessment of German cinema fo‐ vides analyses of flms that are shown to be aes‐ cused primarily on the commercial entertainment thetically more challenging, stylistically more in‐ movies of the Spassgesellschaft that had little am‐ novative, and thematically more complex than bition of being artistically challenging, or of pro‐ the so-called consensus flms. The anthology is voking political or critical thought, unlike the en‐ framed by two articles that discuss the work of deavors of the New German Cinema a generation Edgar Reitz and , two still active earlier. Rentschler only mentioned in passing directors linked to the art cinema movement of flmmakers such as Fatih Akın, Monika Treut, the 1960s and 1970s, and who both predate the Harun Farocki, or Alexander Kluge in his famous "cinema of consensus" and go beyond it, provid‐ article on consensus flmmaking. These directors, ing a continuity of non-consensus German flm‐ together with Andreas Dresen or Angelina Mac‐ making from the 1960s to today. John E. David‐ carone, would most certainly fall outside of a son's engaging opening chapter discusses Kluge, "consensus" category. one of Germany's most intellectual flmmakers The introduction of New Directions prepares and flm philosophers, and Alasdair King's closing its reader for a wide array of essays that critically chapter analyzes Reitz's 3 (2004), which H-Net Reviews received mixed reviews in comparison to his pre‐ scripted, as well as the inclusion of the Gestapo in‐ vious Heimat flms. The large selection of articles terrogator and the importance of Scholl's faith between Kluge's and Reitz's suggests that contem‐ (the latter two elements were either absent from porary German cinema continues to have a the‐ or largely left out in previous flms about the matic fascination with the German past. Generally White Rose). The author is full of praise for Scholl speaking, the majority of flms focusing on Ger‐ and the actor Julia Jentsch as an incarnation of man history range from the Third Reich to the "resilience and grace under pressure" (p. 62). Brad more recent East/West German histories, includ‐ Prager's enlightening piece on The Counterfeiters ing reunifcation and the life after the Wende. (2007), an acclaimed Austrian flm made with Ger‐ Aside from these, there are three articles ded‐ man collaboration, discusses the functionalizing icated to the artistically ambitious Berlin school of music in this flm about Jewish collaborators in and one article to the transnational flm produc‐ concentration camps. The flm raises uneasy ques‐ tions of Akın. The frst seven to eight chapters tions about Jewish collaboration and depicts the could be subsumed under the category of "Ger‐ "heavy burden associated with inhabiting the man Heritage flms," a term coined by Lutz Köp‐ grey zone. It emphasizes both the connections be‐ nick in 2004, or variations thereof (p. 40). Chris‐ tween the prisoners as well as the limits placed on tine Hase analyzes the frst of three flms dealing solidarity in the camp, a contradiction that is dif‐ with the Third Reich that were commercially suc‐ cult" (p. 85). The "[m]usic is ... entangled with the cessful, yet thematically controversial. Her discus‐ attempt to cover over cosmetically what cannot sion of Downfall (2004), a flm which epitomizes be covered over; what is repressed will surely re‐ the defnition of the heritage flm genre as an turn" (p. 87). Prager further suggests that The "easy to digest" flm about the past (p. 40), Counterfeiters juxtaposes complicated historical presents the problematic introduction of emotion‐ aspects of Austria's troubled relationship with the ality into the discourse of the nation's past by us‐ National Socialist past, and contemporary repre‐ ing realism as a mode of representation. Hase sentational questions of the Holocaust. gives an overview of the central debates about the Nick Hodgin ofers the frst of two articles use of realism in dealing with questions of the about the GDR. Good Bye, Lenin! (2003), a com‐ Holocaust. The perceived realism in Downfall was mercially successful and, for the most part, criti‐ the reason for its sharpest criticism in Germany, cally acclaimed flm addresses the recent German particularly its ostensible Verharmlosung of the history of reunifcation. Hodgin contextualizes the Nazi past. Ultimately, the "representational dilem‐ flm about the "forgotten year" (p. 108), as a prod‐ ma" is the main flmic shortcoming. "In its un‐ uct of Generation X Filme, a production company questioned and unrefective realist approach, that has an interest in producing challenging Downfall conceptually simplifes and streamlines flms with a "distinct contemporary sensibility" a complex and largely inconceivable reality. It (p. 100). Hodgin discusses the "emphasis on au‐ thus implies the existence of a logic, order and thenticity" in the flm, and stresses that great care reason that belies the nature of the Nazi regime was taken not to glamorize the state or to repro‐ and its atrocities" (p. 53). Another Heritage flm, duce a "GDR chic" while, at the same time, no though more positively reviewed by the press, is overt criticism of the state was expressed (p. 103). Sophie Scholl: The Final Days (2005). Owen Evans Ultimately, according to Hodgin, the flm, which is analyzes the strategies the flm employs to hu‐ not so much about the GDR as about the present manize the fgure of Sophie Scholl. Evans praises and its relationship to the past, acknowledges the flm's realization of the innate drama inherent both the failings and the achievements of the in the Gestapo tapes, after which the flm was GDR. Next, Cooke discusses a much more contro‐

2 H-Net Reviews versial flm about the GDR, The Lives of Others tutions" (p. 130), this kind of analysis of left-wing (2006). While the German Agency for Political Ed‐ terrorism that encouraged the audiences to refect ucation praised the flm's authenticity and atten‐ about its past seems to be completely absent from tion to detail, it was repeatedly condemned as a this "visually lavish" adaptation of Stefan Aust's consensus flm, as a politically and aesthetically accounts. The flm is instead a production that conservative flm that "trivialize[ed] the misdeeds caters directly to an audience used to the com‐ of the State Security System" (p. 115). Director Flo‐ modifcation of the RAF () in rian Henckel von Donnersmarck sees The Lives as popular culture with "Andy-Warhol-styled pop-art a response to the Ostalgie flms of the previous prints" and stylish photographs in lifestyle and years. Cooke asserts that the Ostalgie flms of Le‐ fashion magazines of its members (p. 131). This ander Hausmann et al. were in fact created as a "uninhibited popularization and glorifcation of response to early Stasi/Dictatorship representa‐ Baader and his comrades is problematic because tion flms that made it seem as if all of GDR every‐ it is informed by a very selective process of re‐ day life was under heavy surveillance of the Stasi. membering and forgetting, which threatens to de‐ And comparing Sun Alley to The Lives, the author contextualize and depoliticizes the RAF" (pp. 132, stresses that while the former flm highlights its 133). David Clarke discusses Requiem (2006) in own artifciality through its décor, street scenes, chapter 8. Here, the director recreates a 1970s etc., The Lives makes everything look very "real," provincial town in West Germany, in which gener‐ "in order to present a perfect re-enactment" (p. ational struggles and the dichotomy between city 120). Unfortunately though, it is precisely this and country are played out. Clarke categorizes the claim for authenticity that makes The Lives prob‐ flm as a type of Heimatflm, with "an invocation lematic. The author observes that this "chilling au‐ of Heimat motifs which actually points to the dis‐ thenticity" (p. 120) was paired with a story that solution of Heimat in the traditional sense" (p. presented Stasi member Wiesler as a humanized 156). fgure who changes his ways through art. Rachel Palfreyman's chapter discusses The Wiesler's conversion becomes an apologetic nar‐ Edukators (2004) as one of many post-unifcation rative about the Stasi crimes. Cooke concludes by flms that refect upon the actions and concerns of stressing that the opening of the Stasi fles were the '68 generation. Like many other flms about important, but that they cannot be "seen as clo‐ this generation it tries to "present the key histori‐ sure or as the fnal word on the reality of life in cal confict in the FRG as a family or generational the GDR" (p. 129). clash" (p. 167). Leaving out the actual violence of Moving from Ostalgie to Westalgie flms, the 1970s, the flm evaluates the values of the '68 Chris Homewood analyzes the Bernd Eichinger generation. The author suggests that The Eduka‐ production Baader Meinhof Complex (2008) in tors engages with a diferent aspect of countercul‐ chapter 7. Claimed to be Germany's most expen‐ tural activism of 1968 by "ofering a situationist sive production to date, the flm depicts urban ter‐ response " (p. 167). "Established in 1957, the Situa‐ rorism in Germany, and was promoted as a flm tionist International was a grouping of European that would "'change the debate on German terror‐ avant-garde artists and thinkers infuenced by ism'" (p. 133). Yet, Homewood reminds us that Dada and surrealism" (p. 167). The Edukators be‐ while the flmic engagement of the New German gin their action in the tradition of this grouping, Cinema with this topic tried to "elucidate the mys‐ whose ideas were "underpinned by a critical terious links between the terrorist violence of reading of a capitalism rooted in Marxist philoso‐ 1977, the post-war response to National Socialism phy" (p. 167). "Weingartner tests the validity of and the perceived authoritarianism of state insti‐ the ideas and values of the 60s in the new German

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Republic which seeks to understand its new iden‐ senior citizens," an artistic initiative which she tity via an examination of its capitalist imperial‐ hopes might grow in the near future (p. 238). ism in an age of globalization" (p. 168). Moving to transnational cinema, chapter 13 is The next three chapters discuss directors dedicated to Akın. Daniela Berghahn reads Akın Christian Petzold, Valeska Griesbach, and Andreas as an exemplary director of diasporic flmmaking Dresen, all of whom are associated with the artis‐ in Europe. By analyzing Akın's breakthrough flm tically ambitious Berlin school. Praised as the Head-On (2004) and its "warehouse of cultural im‐ Nouvelle Vague Allemande , the Berlin school is age" (p. 250), the author discusses the distinctive hailed as a return to the intellectual and aesthetic aesthetics of migrant and diasporic flmmaking, engagements of prior German cinema. In chapter "which refects the 'diasporic optic'" (p. 242). Fur‐ 10, Jaimey Fisher analyzes Petzold's Yella (2007) ther, Berghahn addresses the diverse, multiple under the light of Hollywood's horror genre. Al‐ layers of flmic references in the flm that engage though the strict borders between so-called art diferent (national) audiences. The last chapter and popular cinema have been blurred in recent closes the anthology with a circular movement. (European) cinema scholarship, Fisher states that Recalling the discussion of Kluge at the beginning current analyses "re-establish the conventional di‐ of the book, Alasdair King discusses Edgar Reitz, a chotomy of art versus popular cinema" (p. 189). director whose flmic output stretches from the Fisher provides an enlightening analysis of Yella, 1960s to the present. King discusses Heimat 3 in which Petzold refunctions the horror genre for (2004) and suggests, on the one hand, that most his purposes. In chapter 11, Marco Abel analyzes criticism on the flm might be right. While his ear‐ Valeska Griesbach's aesthetic employment of real‐ lier Heimat flms were more in the lines of Rainer ism and reads her flm(s) as a "counter program to Werner Fassbinder, Kluge, and Helma Sanders- the aesthetics of the 'state flms'" (p. 207). Using Brahms (in terms of their mode of interrogating convincing camera and sound examples, Abel German history), Heimat 3 might seem to have provides insights about Griesbach's employment moved more into the realm of a "cinema of con‐ of realism, her "aesthetic modalities of represen‐ sensus" (p. 260). On the other hand, through an in- tational realism and malerisch tableaux vivants," depth analysis of the mediascapes, local land‐ which he reads as opposed to the authenticity scapes, and the flm's discussion of Heimat as a lo‐ claims and "reality as it is" presentations of histo‐ cale, King suggests that thematically, the flm is ry in "state flms" (pp. 214, 207). Lastly, Laura G. more ambitious than it was given credit for. McGee informs us that not only aesthetically, but Heimat 3 has an "element of cultural pessimism also through content, Berlin school director about the ongoing possibility of a contemporary Dresen brings serious and neglected topics to the spatial Heimat" (p. 274). Although it might be less screen, including that of geriatric romance. The innovative than its earlier installments, Heimat 3 author stresses that despite the growing demo‐ still "shows difculties of creating a sense of com‐ graphics of elderly citizens, desire and passion munity and is skeptical about the consensus in the among them have for the longest time not been present," (p. 274) and therefore provides a critical treated seriously in flm. Geriatric romance has tone. appeared as "ridiculous to younger people, who In conclusion, this anthology lends itself per‐ are supposed to have the monopoly on love and fectly to teaching German cinema. Providing a sex" (p. 227). McGee suggests that Dresen's Cloud 9 discussion and an extension of Rentschler's criti‐ (2008) might be the initiation of a "realistic, dy‐ cal assessment of 1990s German cinema in the namic and diferentiated portrayal of the lives of new millennium, and introducing categories such

4 H-Net Reviews as New Heritage flms, Westalgie and Ostalgie flms, diasporic flm, the Berlin school, and so forth, New Directions is a great resource for criti‐ cal discussions of contemporary German flm, in particular when scrutinizing contemporary nar‐ ratives and popular discourses about the German past in German flm. The recurring discussions of the trivializations of the German past or the au‐ thenticity claims of individual history flms serve as enlightening readings for critical assessments of contemporary German cinema. In combination with other texts, this anthology would signifcant‐ ly enrich any course dedicated to German cultural productions. Note [1]. Eric Rentschler, "From New German Cine‐ ma to the Post-Wall Cinema of Consensus," in Cin‐ ema and Nation, ed. Mette Hjort and Scott MacKenzie (London and New York: Routledge, 2000), 260-277.

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Citation: Berna Gueneli. Review of Cooke, Paul; Homewood, Chris, eds. New Directions in German Cinema. H-German, H-Net Reviews. September, 2013.

URL: https://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=36913

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