Can a filmmaker born and raised in West Germany strike just the right tone in a film set in the former East Germany? I hadn't given this question much thought, but the Berliner Zeitung raised it in response to Christian Petzold's Barbara, about a Berlin paediatrician who is relegated to the province for punishment after requesting to travel west. The daily newspaper with no less than four full pages of Berlinale coverage daily concludes that it can be done and is even very impressed. And indeed, this first German league title makes a promising bid for the Golden Bear.
Without making the story very spectacular or stuffing it full of GDR nostalgia, Petzold manages to evoke the feeling of what it is like to live in a country where you always have to be on your guard. Petzold's muse Nina Hoss, a great actress for whom minimalist acting seems to have been invented, plays the degraded doctor with a subtle mixture of pride and vigilance. She knows that, as a Berliner, she will not only be mistaken for a shit-head, but also realises that anyone can snitch on her. This is quite apart from the humiliating searches she has to put up with. Back straight, she keeps her distance because even a kind word can conceal a different intention. Barbara not only creates a penetrating picture of the GDR anno 1980 but also shows how destructive it is when trust between people is eroded.
Admittedly, Barbara is less imaginative than, say Das Leben der Anderen, but let's hope there is nevertheless a Dutch distributor that will do its best for it. Surely it may finally be known in our country too that Christian Petzold (Yella, Jerichow) is one of the most interesting directors of the current generation of Germans.
Yesterday was also the European premiere of the prestigious Chinese war drama screened out of competition The Flowers of War, which in turn was disappointing. The director Zhang Yimou, who has risen high in China - filmgoers of the first hour know The red cornfield still - filmed a story set during the infamous Japanese occupation of Nangking in 1937. In it, a purely money-hungry American adventurer emerges as the saviour of a group of schoolgirls and prostitutes. Heavy-handed effects and sentiment are used in The Flowers of War not shied away from and, in doing so, it is strongly reminiscent of the history of another Western saviour in Nangking, German John Rabe. That fact was impressively filmed a few years ago by Chuan Lu as City of Life and Death. That film was a bit difficult, partly because the events in it are partly shown from the perspective of a Japanese soldier. Zhang Yimou sticks to uncluttered heroism, but it cannot match its predecessor.
Leo Bankersen
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