Das weisse Band - Eine deutsche Kindergeschichte (2009)

Director:

Michael Haneke

Writer:

Michael Haneke (writer)

Release Date:

24 September 2009 (Austria)

Genre:

Crime | Drama | Mystery

Plot:

Strange events happen in a small village in the north of Germany during the years just before World War I, which seem to be ritual punishment. The abused and suppressed children of the villagers seem to be at the heart of this mystery. |

Plot Keywords:

Church Service | Rural Life | Narration | Crime Against Child | Narrator

Awards:

Nominated for Golden Globe. Another 9 wins & 4 nominations

Cast

Christian Friedel	...	The School Teacher
Ernst Jacobi	...	The School Teacher (voice)
Leonie Benesch	...	Eva
Ulrich Tukur	...	The Baron
Ursina Lardi	...	The Baronin
Fion Mutert	...	Sigi
Michael Kranz	...	The Home Teacher
Burghart Klaußner	...	The Pastor
Steffi Kühnert	...	The Pastor's Wife
Maria-Victoria Dragus	...	Klara
Leonard Proxauf	...	Martin
Levin Henning	...	Adolf
Johanna Busse	...	Margarete
Thibault Sérié	...	Gustav
Josef Bierbichler	...	The Steward

Also Known As:

The White Ribbon (International: English title) (UK) (USA)
Il nastro bianco (Italy)
Le ruban blanc (France)
The White Tape or the Teacher's Tale (International: English title) (working title)

MPAA:

Rated R for some disturbing content involving violence and sexuality.

Runtime:

144 min

Country:

Austria | Germany | France | Italy

Language:

German | Italian | Polish | Latin

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

DTS | Dolby Digital

Certification:

USA:R (certificate #45622) | USA:R | Switzerland:14 (canton of Vaud) | Switzerland:14 (canton of Geneva) | UK:15 | Ireland:15A

Filming Locations:

Leipzig, Saxony, Germany

Company:

X-Filme Creative Pool

Trivia:

Germany's official submission to 82nd Academy Award's Foreign Language in 2010.

Nurturing Fascism Somewhere in Black and White Germany

During the course of the year before WWI, a series of tragic and suspicious looking incidents take place in a small farming village somewhere in black and white Germany. The culprit or the culprits behind the crime wave will not be too easy to find.

The doctor, the priest, the baron and the teacher who also narrates the film form the elite of the village. We get to know each one of them and a few other villagers along with children of this village, calm on the surface but deeply tormented by an undercurrent of brutality, envy, malice and apathy.

The children's natural path to maturity is blocked by strict religious morality, cruelly enforced by the priest, thereby inhibiting their personal observation of the world around them. The priest feeds children with guilt and sexual repression instead of love and punishes even their most innocent mistakes. Certainly this environment will make it easy for them to not only accept but seek ruthless authority later in life.

As might be expected, love in this town is restrained and uneasy, while incest and affairs are overlooked by villagers. The Baron employs half of the village in his farm, yet almost no one seems to be against feudalism, nor rise up against the accidents that happen in the workplace. Social justice is a stranger to town, yet villagers are entrenched in apathy.

If adults do not face up the truth, however this truth might be against their convictions, rise up and take charge, then who will? And according to whose morality? Isn't fascism with racism, in short Nazism, misdirected popular anger and an easy response to deep injustices within a society ? Haneke observes mostly psychological, educational and religious roots of Nazism while leaving economic aspects mostly in the background.

Visuals of the film are very solid. The symmetry in the shots and the tidiness of the houses, even of those belonging to the poor farmers hint at the discipline and rigor Germans are well known for. Acting is top notch by the whole cast, especially children's faces beam just like in Bergman films. Directing was superb.

Haneke uses a village and a narrator similar in essence to Lars Von Trier's Dogville, still these two movies are clearly different.

Das Weisse Band has also some similarities to Cache, but just one notch less satisfying than his masterpiece which had a slightly more intriguing and fulfilling story. This movie is made more accessible by Haneke with his choice of more obvious tips, where sometimes characters talk directly about the situation. But in a time and age when people are battling too many problems and drug themselves with TV and easy payoffs who could blame Haneke?

Given the current global economic conditions and the fanaticism running high across all three major religions, this is a must-see movie for anyone caring about the future of our global village to avoid a Le Temps du Loup type of ending!