German Films

After Goodbye Lenin, I'm watching Beyond Silence.

Holy shit. Humans Are Flawed and Black-and-Grey Morality up the wazoo in the Eastern Front. The fim seems to have a knack at showing people doing horrible things beyond the Moral Event Horizon and still coming off as sympathetic and understandable (often downright pathetic) rather than straight villains. The protagonist included; a Hero Protagonist, he is not.

EDIT: And the Phenotype Stereotype scene is the most comical thing ever. The protagonist is a Jew that lied about his ethnicity. He joined the Wehrmacht, became a war hero, and was enrolled in a Hitler Youth school. A teacher gives a lecture about what the evil Jews look like, gives a lecture about the gem of humanity that the Nordic man is (to the visible and hilarious smugness of the blue-eyes blond guys and the equally hilarious disappointment of the darker types), and finally takes our "hero" and, soberly and sterny, measures him with his scientific instruments. The verdict is clear; while his ancestors may have mixed their blood with other tribes in the past, he is, nevertheless a perfect example of the true Aryan race.

edited 12th Oct '12 8:43:50 AM by TheHandle

I can't remember, is M a German film or a Hollywood film in German?

Wikipedia calls it a German film. Good enough for me. They call Hitler an Austrian-born German politician.

I'd like to watch german movies that aren't about the Nazis or the DDR... It's not that I don't find an inside view of both topics uninteresting, it's just that I'd like to try something more Hollywood-ish, like a Luc Besson film, but German.

So, is this thread just about German films in general? Because all I've seen are Nekromantik and the first three Violent Shit films (still waiting for Synapse to release that box set they promised a while back).

I have Slasher◊ lying around, not yet opened.

I did not need to know those films existed. I don't think I'd like to talk about them.

I guess the best German movie I've seen is F.W. Murnau's Sunrise: A Song of two Humans and Friz Lang's M. Of Werner Herzog's my favourite is Nosferatu but it has some overly long takes, which is pretty typical for the director. Somehow Tarkovsky and some other directors manage to make long takes interesting whereas in Herzog's case they manage to kill the scenes.

I somehow forgot to mention the 2006 flick Cannibal, which is odd considering its repulsiveness and narmy English dubbing (the fat bald guy's bizarre girly voice...) Grotesque, but artsy. Amazing how someone who apparently came out from under the dreadful Ulli Lommel's wing could make something so atmospheric.

Um, awright.

edited 13th Oct '12 4:53:08 AM by LordCrayak

The 90s were a good decade for German cinema, especially of the more indie variety. I remember Knockin' on Heaven's Door as one of my favorite German movies, though I haven't seen it in a while.

edited 13th Oct '12 8:06:14 AM by 0Emmanuel

I can't find it through PERFECTLY LEGAL MEANS. The Cowboy Bebop film of the same title keeps showing up instead. Which is a very nice film and all, but not what I seek. Does it have another, more germanisitisch name?

Oh, and I love Thil Schweiger ever since I saw Barfuss. Which should have a goddamned page, it was such a good movie. It even had Eric in it, playing the most hilarious, dorky John to have ever graced the movie screens!

Sorry, Knockin' on Heaven's Door is the original, "German" title of the film. Checking the internet there do appear to be floating around DVD versions, however, apparently with English dub/sub even. So, the film still exists somewhere.

Another one I fondly remember is Der Eisbär. It also has Til Schweiger in it. Hm, why is it that the same people who made good German movies in the 90s are making bad ones nowadays? Or maybe that, in itself, is the explanation.

edited 14th Oct '12 4:06:20 AM by 0Emmanuel

The TV around here shows German ersatz of American disaster movies, occasional Adventurer Archaeologist story, and melodramas that benefit from the fact that Europe has actual old aristocratic families.

edited 21st Oct '12 1:37:07 PM by lordGacek

What, those people still exist?

0Emmanuel: Well, Germany has a rather limited repertoire of actors, due to its rather limited size, in comparison to the US. Imagine the situation in Austria, for that matter! The same actors, over and over, in virtually every movie.

Sadly, the best Austrian movies tend to be closely connected to local customs and dialect, so one cannot safely recommend them to an American audience, and I'm not sure whether subs/dubs are available. Also, they tend to either come with pitch-black humor, or just pitch-black. With that in mind, the movie versions of Wolf Haas' crime fiction series are incredibly great, and one can't deny that Michael Haneke is a genius. Don't watch his films unless you plan on committing suicide anyway... You have been warned!

Also, The White Sound, starring Daniel Brühl. Astonishingly thoughtful exploration of a young man tumbling into paranoid schizophrenia.

As for actual German movies, practically the only one that immediately springs to my mind is Run Lola Run.

Oh wait, I just found this list.

edited 22nd Oct '12 7:40:24 AM by vijeno