Light House Film Club

Director: Uli Edel

Cert: 15

Time: 2 hrs 30 mins (German with subtitles)

As a child of the 70’s the Baader Meinhof Gang, like the IRA, is seared into my conscience. Such was their fascination that even I was drawn to reading and learning more about them.

Uli Edel’s excellent film, which was this year’s German contender for the best foreign-language film Oscar, provides a graphic account of their rise and ultimate fall. In so doing it both enthrals and disturbs. From the outside the Baader Meinhof Gang had a mythical quality, a small group of glamorous individuals fighting the behemoth of a mean and repressive state. Yet by showing us the senseless brutality of many of their acts, their complete lack of respect for authority and the unhinged state of Andreas Baader’s mind, one concludes that by ultimately committing suicide they did everyone a great service.

If I were to have any criticism it is that in trying to compress a ten year time span into two and a half hours, with little indication of the passage of time, one is left with the impression of a Germany on the edge of meltdown. The reality was anything but. Furthermore one never really understands why a group of privileged middle class students should transform themselves into ruthless killers. Were they just doing it for kicks? That said by choosing to view the conflict from both sides, Bruno Ganz playing the intelligent head of Germany’s Anti Terror Unit, it provides important lessons that are very much relevant today.

Rating: 4/5

Patrons: Approx 14

CA

Cert 15   138 mins

In an era of growing concern about the Big Brother society and particularly the rise in the use of CCTV cameras it is perhaps an opportune time to reappraise what living in a surveillance society was really like. We got a powerful sense of this in the excellent Red Road and The Lives of Others is in a similar idiom; understated, tense, sad but ultimately redemptive. Set in the East Germany of 1984, a time when socialism is starting to crumble, it captures perfectly the joyless existence of both its citizens and those in the security services intent on maintaining control.

The story follows three main characters. Georg Dreyman (Sebastian Koch) the state’s favourite playwright, his girlfriend and celebrated actress Christa Maria Sieland (Martina Gedeck) and Gerd Wiesler (Ulrich Muhe) the Stasi Security Captain. One evening at a performance of one of Dreyman’s plays, Wiesler suggests to his boss that Dreyman is arrogant and should be watched. The suggestion gains favour with the corrupt and repulsive Minister, Bruno Hempf, who sees an opportunity to get Dreyman out of the way so that he can pursue the beautiful Sieland. What follows is a tense and emotional tale of surveillance, interrogation, fear, trust and betrayal in which Wiesler (the chief snoop) comes to loathe his wretched life and seeks to help the man he is trying to trap.

If ever there were a more damming indictment of life under communism it is this and throughout I was reminded of the speech made by J F Kennedy in June 1963 whilst on a trip to Berlin. He said “Freedom has many difficulties and democracy is not perfect but we never had to put up a wall to keep our people in”. Whilst there are still those who long for the “good old days of communism” this film will dispel any thoughts that it was a force for good. Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck’s directorial and screenwriting debut is a triumph. His challenge now is to follow it up with something as equally powerful.

Rating: 5/5

CA