In the Labyrinth
of Silence (2014): Written
by Giulio Ricciarelli and Elisabeth Bartel, directed by Giulio Ricciarelli. Starring:
Alexander Fehling, Johannes Kirsch, Friederike Becht, Hansi Jochmann, Johann
von Buelow, Gert Voss, Robert Hunger-Buehler, and Andre Szymanski. Running
Time: 122 minutes.
Rating: 3/4
One of the most enduring debates in
our world is how to approach reconciliation and healing after great crimes are
committed, especially on a national or state level. There is no one clear answer, no one path or
set of rules that can be universally applied to all situations. Sometimes great conflicts or crimes are
maintained in an uneasy, “stable” status quo, like in Korea. Some are only resolved when a particular side
wins decisively on the field of battle, like in Sri Lanka. Some societies choose to tackle the wounds of
the past directly through formal organizations like South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation
Commission. And some, like the German
government in the years immediately following WWII and the revelations of the
Holocaust, choose silence.
This is the world that a young lawyer,
Johann Radmann, has grown up in, experiencing only the non-confrontational
post-war world of Konrad Adenauer and the German “Economic Miracle.” Currently paying his legal dues in the rather
dull world of legal traffic violations, he yearns for the chance to do
something of substance, inspired by the example set by his father, himself a
lawyer prior to his disappearance during the War. He seizes his chance when an aggressive
journalist, Thomas Gnielka, confronts his colleagues with a claim by a friend
of his, a survivor of Auschwitz survivor named Simon Kirsch. Having been not old enough to grasp his circumstances during the war
itself, he is almost completely unaware of the true extent of Nazi brutality,
and holds only a hazy notion of Auschwitz as a POW camp of sorts.
Despite his profound naiveté, or
perhaps because of it, a senior member of the office named Fritz Bauer enlists
him, another lawyer, and a secretary to fully investigate all leads that the
journalist and his friend can provide regarding any surviving guards from
Auschwitz that can be tried murder. And
they have to have convincing proof that the people were either complicit in or
fully aware of the extent of the killing that went on, since actual murder
charges are the only ones not affected by a previously agreed-upon statute of
limitations. Bauer has been chomping at
the bit for years, looking for the chance to strike back at the former Nazis he
knows are still free at every level of German society, but has been helpless to
do anything about it due to the agreement reached among the Western powers
following the Nuremberg Trials that any further members of Hitler’s government
would either be ignored, or if they proved useful against the growing strength
of the Soviet Union, protected. The goal
is a single, massive trial, with as many survivors testifying against as many
former SS members as possible, so as to finally break the veil of silence that
has descended upon the country, resulting in a generation growing up entirely ignorant
of the blood on their country’s hands.
Johann’s lack of comprehension of
the scale of the tragedy is brutally rectified in his very first interview with
another survivor. Surprised at the blasé
nature of his questions, the man stares incredulously at him and asks (through
an interpreter), “You want to know what crimes I saw? Do you not realize what Auschwitz was? They murdered hundreds of thousands of
people!” After hearing this, a look of
realization can be seen striking Johann right between the eyes; an abyss of
unending darkness has opened up beneath his feet, and he almost dares not look
down for fear of what he may see in the void below.
But look he must, and he does, even
as the work begins to wear him down and affect his relationship with friends
and his love for a young seamstress named Marlene. Through his interviews with survivors and his
scouring of leftover records in the IG-Farbenhaus in Frankfurt (now the
official offices for the US 5th Corps), he slowly develops both the
case they need and his own terrifying understanding of both the extent of
German atrocities and of the parallel terrors of silence imposed on the topic
since then. He learns of the experiments
(and continued freedom) of Josef Mengele, aka the Angel of Death, delves into
his own father’s connection to the Nazi party, and as a result begins to lose
his own ability to trust anyone he knows with even tangential connections to
the war.
Like with another German film from
earlier this year, Phoenix, Im Labyrinth des Schweigens never needs to
resort to explicit depictions of the sufferings of the camps to have the
desired effect. We have all seen the
photos and the videos. We have seen
movies like Schindler’s List, making
the horrors of Auschwitz more real to us than any book or documentary
could. Any piling on top of that would
be redundant and numbing. Instead, the
director chose deliberately to focus on the people themselves, as they tell
their stories, with long close-ups of their faces as they struggle to reconcile
themselves with the terrible events they have no choice but to remember. It’s almost a way to regain the humanity of
those who suffered, to show them as individuals, something that can easily be
lost amidst talk of the massive numbers of dead involved.
Johann’s emotional journey through
the experience of preparing the trial, in many ways written to reflect the
spiritual struggles of the entire country in its efforts to be able to face
these crimes, is portrayed flawlessly by Alexander Fehling. The man comes fully equipped at all times with
a beautifully trembling lower lip for whenever a moment of pure, emotional
pathos is needed. His character is in
many ways a stand-in for us as the audience.
Any of us raised with a proper understanding of history have had to
experience the same moments he does: the unknowing innocence in our early years
of what people are capable of, the sense of unspeakable horror when we first
confront the darkness or potential in us and those around us, and the daily
struggle to be able to reconcile the conflicting natures of humanity so as to
not allow ourselves to be dragged down into the abyss as well.
Given that the film, the first
feature-length work by Giulio Ricciarelli, is attempting to shed light on a
crucial aspect of German social development and reconciliation during the Cold
War that has been ignored up ‘til now, I do feel that it could have delved
further into the legal and cultural challenges facing everyone involved in the
process. As a vehicle for conveying the
evils of Nazism, it is certainly more muted in its approach than more explicit
films dealing with the same subject matter, which will perhaps rob it of a deep
emotional impact on many. Nonetheless,
this is also a part of the tale of Germany and the Holocaust, and is therefore
every bit as much worth remembering as the chilling memories of death in the
camps themselves. It needs a place in
our collective memories as an example of the little bits of good than can be
done in our daily lives to counter such awful acts, to rebuild what others
would destroy.
-Noah
Franc
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