Hi! Recently, I saw a german film that I found thoroughly interesting, in that
it studies our prejudices about totalitarist regimes rising nowadays: Die Welle (The
Wave).
Rainer Wenger is a teacher in a german High school, who is, because of his
rather unconventionnal teaching methods, forced to teach autocratique
regimes to his pupils, much to his disapointment.
So, on the first day of school, Wenger introduces the subject by asking the
kids a simple question:Do you think another Third Reich alike regime
could rise in Europe nowadays?. To which they categorically answer that it
is impossible for that to happen, arguing that seeing how they have been told
all their life how terrible it was, it wouldn't cross anyone's mind ever again
to create such a thing.
He then decides to create a real life role play in the class, little by
little surreptitiously instauring rules in this mini-community: a salute, a name
(The wave), a uniforme; all of these which were of course part of the nazi rules.
This cummunity quickly spreads oustide the classroom, and the pupils start
to promote it by tagging waves all around town and organizing meetings. Soon,
whoever isn't a part of the Wave is persecuted: Wenger's project has got out
of hand.
I won't tell you the end, but I encourage you to watch this very
sociologically interesting movie, in German of course!
I've read the book and I loved it ! :)
ReplyDeleteI saw this film like two years ago, and I still remember how chocked I was after seeing it. It was as we could say a hard and moralising film.
ReplyDeleteThe book is gorgeous !
ReplyDeleteIt's nice to see a German film appear on the OIB blog and see OIB and Abibac students comment on it. Thanks for this opportunity, Paul.
ReplyDeleteGirls , did you read the book in English or German? I imagine Carla read it in English and Gabrielle read it in German but it might be very interesting to read it in both languages. I am very tempted to do so.
I imagine that you know that it won the 1981 Massachusetts Book Award for Children's/Young Adult literature and is very popular in German classrooms.
I really liked this movie and also read the book. That's a really good way to make people react about such a serious topic. Like someone said earlier, it is a very moralising film, that make us wonder a lot.
ReplyDeleteI read the book and I loved it because I thought,like the pupils in the film ,that an autocratic "regime" couldn't appear nowadays. Indeed we know how it appeared in the former years so we should be able to avoid it...but this story shows the contrary! I recommend it(book and movie)
ReplyDelete