Running Head: NARRATING REDEMPTION

Narrating Redemption: Das Wunder von Bern and the "Miracles" of Football Hannah Troxel NYU Gallatin School of Individualized Study

NARRATING REDEMPTION Abstract

This paper uses the 2003 German film Das Wunder von Bern as a social document from which to glean narratives of appropriate Germanness and methods of handling the past. Specifically, it investigates the uses of football/soccer in the film as a way of redeeming Nazi fathers (that is, washing them of their Nazi nature; making them appropriate once more; retraining them to live in a newly civilized society) through the ways of innocent, sport-loving sons in a reversal of the traditional jeremiad narrative. Furthermore, it examines the films role in and reflection of German societys often problematic navigation of both the period directly after World War II and the more recent unification of the German state. Themes of victimization, unity, and reborn innocence are shown to coalesce in the sentimentality of Das Wunder von Bern, effectively pulling at the German nations collective heartstrings and revealing common ways of understanding German identity. Keywords: Film, German Studies, National Identity, Cultural Analysis

NARRATING REDEMPTION Introduction: Narratives, ways of explaining and communicating the past and its connection to the

present, play a tremendous role in the formation, reformation, and invigoration of societies. From the earliest creation myths to present-day stories of nationhood or struggle, narratives and their various structures are used to cement groups of people and their ideals, helping to fixate identity. Since the beginning of the twentieth century, however, these grand narratives have seen themselves subject to filmic interpretation, suddenly removed from the hands of the select storytellers and speechmakers to be mass distributed and brought visually and aurally to wider ranges of people. The history of the mass distribution of master narratives is especially interesting in the German context. Germany, in the Nazi Era, once used film for explicitly propagandist purposes, and now has to struggle through its cinema with both the nations history outside of film and its own dark cinematic history. Entrenched in this German context, this paper will discuss Snke Wortmanns popular 2003 film, Das Wunder von Bern. This film, in approaching post-war German history and the 1954 FIFA World Cup, actively (although not necessarily purposefully) works with preexisting German narratives and sports culture to provide a useful narrative that Germans can use not only to situate themselves as unfortunate victims regarding Nazism but also to create a post-reunification ideal of acceptable Germanness. By reversing the traditional jeremiad narrative structure, this film creates a haven for the sons of Nazism as well as the sons of separation in which they can practice sport-focused, unified Germanness.

The Jeremiad: An Explanation The jeremiad itself is a common narrative structure. Its name, of course, is based off of the works of the biblical prophet Jeremiah, but the use of the jeremiad has a exists beyond purely

NARRATING REDEMPTION religious contexts spanning from The Odyssey to the autobiography of Frederick Douglas to general political speech. The structure is, in principle, fairly simple: a moral/cultural problem of present-day society is identified as having resulted from the abandoning of the fathers house (often the Founding Fathers, in terms of American usage, the founders of religions, or, simply, the way things were). The narrator is presented as the good son who will protect and bring society back to the morally superior ways of the father. In light of a perceived problem, the jeremiad calls for cultural revitalization of [the dominant orders] authentic but jeopardized values (Shulman, 1996, p. 298). Through this revitalization, the jeremiad works to reinforce identities, outlining what it means to be a real American, real Muslim, real Communist, and so forth. However, as common as this narrative structure may be, it is largely unacceptable in the German context. How can such a society even try to defend its fathers house when the walls, roof, and (arguably) foundation are tainted with the atrocities of Nazism? Yes, Germans can

attempt to call back to earlier pasts, like the motivations behind the Berlin governments plans to rebuild the City Palace, but the weight of National Socialism still rests heavily on the nations shoulders. A societal narrative that fails to include some mention of the Third Reich is vastly incomplete, but one that glorifies the Nazi Era is even more unacceptable. Thus, other narrative structures are found, created, and used, such as that which is exhibited in Das Wunder von Bern.

Das Wunder von Bern as Reversed Jeremiad Das Wunder von Bern may seem like an unlikely choice when discussing topics as weighty as German narrative and identity. It sentimentally recounts the unexpected West German win of the 1954 FIFA World Cup, the first World Cup competition Germans were allowed to participate in after the end of World War II. Alongside the well-known football

NARRATING REDEMPTION championship runs the story of a fictional family from Essen. Eleven-year-old Matthias Lubanski, has lived his entire life without a father, cared for by his mother, older brother, and sister. His father, Richard, was a German soldier taken captive by the Soviet Army, who returns home in 1954, unaware that Matthias even exists. The film chronicles the fathers difficulties in adjusting to West German life and the sphere of the family, moving from rejection and harsh Prussian punishment of Matthias and the childs nave behavior to acceptance of his son (and,

thus, the new West Germany) through the medium of sport. Das Wunder von Bern is, ultimately, a feel-good, touching recount of 1954s miracle, but it is because of this quality, not in spite of it, that the film can be studied as a cultural document that displays a distinct narrative structure: a reversed jeremiad. Before Richard first arrives home, the family dynamic, while not perfect, resembles that of a group that is comfortable with itself, one that has survived due to its unity. For example, the four speak freely at the dinner table, even when the elder son recounts the fact that he refused to take a job set up for him in the difficult post-War economic climate. A lamp above the dinner table shines light down upon the actors, warming their complexions and highlighting the colors in their costumes, while simultaneously creating an ocean of darker, grey walls around the table. Warm lighting and colors are often used to separate these four family members, especially Matthias, from the father. When Richard returns home after eleven years imprisonment, the dynamic visibly, explicitly changes. In the scene in which Richard first arrives on a train full of prisoners, not only is the dialogue terse and almost painful to hear (he calls his daughter by his wifes name, and is encountered with the surprise of Matthias), but the very colors in the scene are cooler, greyer, more washed out. For example, Christa, the mother, wears a blue-grey skirt suit, while Richard is clothed in his greyish, unkempt prisoners garb. The scene is set against the

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black sides of the train, a cloudy sky, and the charcoal grey siding of a nearby building. The next scene, around the dinner table, shares these cool, grey colors while presenting explicitly what was implied before: when Richard sternly snaps at his older son to speak when [hes] asked to, the harshness and brutality of the fathers behavior is sufficiently laid as the foundation for the film (Wortmann 2003). At this point, it is obvious that the film cannot argue for a return to the ways of the father. Both Richards involvement in the Nazis warfare and his cold behavior, especially towards the innocent Matthias (the construction of this innocence will be returned to later), imply that it is the father who has strayed from the correct path. Richards brutality escalates into violence specifically against Matthias in two instances. After Matthias admits that he had lit a candle in church for his father figure (as the older brother puts it) and best friend, local and national player Helmut Rahn, Richard brings the child onto the street and slaps him, stating that Matthias was abusing the church and that German boys dont cry (Wortmann 2003). The second instance results from Matthias attempting to run away from home. Richard finds Matthias in the train station and drags the child home. Matthias is then harshly beaten with a belt by his father until Christa intervenes. This second instance marks the height of Richards coldness and brutal, strict conception of family discipline an obvious reference to how discipline functioned under Hitler. It functions as a turning point in the narrative from which the jeremiad truly begins to assume a reversed form, and also serves to cast a frown on such a Prussian-inspried, National Socialist conception of masculinity, so that more appropriate (sport-related) masculinities can take its place. The term reversed jeremiad denotes a father coming back to the ways of the son (back because every father was once a son), as opposed to staying with the damaged and

NARRATING REDEMPTION morally unacceptable ways of the father. In Das Wunder von Bern, the ways of the son are embodied in the practice and values of football. The film takes pains to establish Matthias love of the sport, shown through his attachment to Rahn (who calls the child his good luck charm), his intense following of the World Cup and the games of the local team, and his participation in the neighborhood childrens muddy makeshift football matches. At one point, Matthias says to his father that Mom said [he the father] used to play football (Wortmann 2003). Although Richard does not admit to having once enjoyed the sport, this moment denotes Richards potential to go back to something purer, to leave behind the taint of both Nazi militaristic brutality and of life in a POW camp that have marked his experience of being Matthias father. Football is presented as the alternative to the worst attributes of the past, as a way to recover the right kind of Germanness athletically competitive but not strict and spiteful. After the turning point of the belt beating, Richard attempts to reconcile with his family by preparing the main course of dinner (later revealed to be Matthias pet rabbits) and giving gifts to his children at the table. Lit in a warm orange-peach glow and devoid of the blue-grey callowness that colored his presence, Richard gives his son a brand new ball, showing his recognition of the importance of the sport. Although the slaughter of the rabbits is a misstep,

Richard soon makes the ultimate step in returning to the ways of the son as embodied in football. A conversation between him and a priest transitions into a sequence in which he finds the childrens old dirt-caked ball, dribble it around, and performs an impressive overhead kick that sends the ball flying through the makeshift goal posts and sets Richard himself firmly back on the right path the path of the son. The scene has a mystical, redemptive, almost religious quality to it, enhanced by the impossibly of Richards kick, especially when we take into consideration the harsh conditions he had been subject to the Soviets. This is the first of the

NARRATING REDEMPTION films Wunder miracles in that it simply should not be able to happen, but it does. The filmmaker may have intended this moment to emphasize the healing power of sport of the German national pastime but it also has the effect of producing critical disbelief. Beyond its emotional, heartstrings-pulling action, one gains the slightest suspicion as the ball flies pasts the posts that, perhaps, the entire film chronicles impossibilities. Not long after this magical transformation, the film sends Richard and Matthias on a journey southward to Bern to see the final match of the World Cup. It is on this journey that we see Richard truly emerging from the coldness that is presented (problematically) to have been

forced on him by Nazism. This emergence is intrinsically linked, both by chronology and by the warming of Richards colors and lighting over the film, to the ways of the son, embodied in the junction between the innocence of Matthias and the sport of football. When in the Weltmeister train (in which the champion German team travels through the nation, and into which Richard and Matthias were invited by Matthias mentor) Richard breaks down crying (in reaction to a letter from the older son, who left for East Berlin), the jeremiad has undergone an entire reversal. As Matthias states that he thinks German boys can cry now and then, he assumes the role of the comforter, the one who accepts Richard back into the sons house, tears and all, through the means of football (Wortmann 2003).

Victimization and Redeeming the Fathers It is important at this point to discuss existing conceptions of post-war Germanness, specifically those expressed contemporary to the film. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, social psychologist Harald Welzer (2005) conducted a study regarding German family narratives of World War II. Germans, especially younger Germans, are generally quite well informed about the historical events and can correctly define key terms such as Auschwitz and SS, but the

NARRATING REDEMPTION study concludes that they experience a surprising disconnect when talking about their own familys involvement in the mechanisms of the Third Reich (Welzer, 2005, p. 1). In fact, much of the family talk supports a victimization narrative. For example, a seven-year-old interviewed in the study stated that as one person, you couldnt do anything. You could say, I think its bad, [but] youd be locked up and probably shot (Welzer, 2005, p. 8). Sometimes, the

narratives even lead to an unwarranted heroization, clinging on to claims that ones grandparents had continued to shop at Jewish stores, or had never been openly cruel to a Jew, even if these family members had supported National Socialism. And, of course, if family members admit to having been Nazis, there is almost always an immediate justification, citing being forced into the Party or perhaps an unfortunate economic situation (Welzer, 2005, p. 23). Welzer also conducted a survey, which revealed that 1 percent [of respondents] thought it was possible that [their relatives] were directly involved in the crimes while 65 percent of participants believe their parents and grandparents suffered a lot in the war (Welzer, 2005, p. 26). The general personal, family narrative is one of victimization and a lack of blame, or an active scrubbing away of blame that might actually exist. How, then, does the reversed jeremiad in Das Wunder von Bern fit with these prominent attributes of German family narratives? The answer to this question lies in the films construction innocence, both Matthias and Richards. The innocence of Matthias is palpable from the beginning of the film, easy to identify. The character skates along the line of clich with his adorableness, hiding in his rabbit hutch and giving a heartwarming smile when his childhood crush, the only girl who plays football in the neighborhood, tells him he played well. His innocence is also demarcated by his distance from Nazism. Eleven years old, he is far too young to have a guilty connection to the Third Reich. Skinny-legged, blue-eyed, and Lederhosen-clad,

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the character not only represents an innocent child but also a mythical, ideal innocent Germany, fixated on football and industriously making ends meet. His only interests are football, his rabbits, and creating new cigarettes from the tobacco in disposed butts, which he then sells to help his hard-hit family. Richards innocence is, understandably, more complicated. It is, however, heavily related to the narratives Welzer uncovered. Although Richard is often portrayed as harsh, strict, and cold, this behavior is not entirely blamed on him. When talking to Matthias, Christa practically echoes the seven-year-old quoted above: One person alone couldnt do a thing. You had to join them. Its not my fault, Matthias asserts, to which Christa replies Is it Dads fault? (Wortmann 2003). Even though Richard later mentions the Russians not having enough to eat due to German sabotage, the focus is on German suffering. Notably, Jews or the Holocaust are never mentioned. Nazism and war are presented as outside forces that work on the level of fate, so the question of whether Richard actually believed in National Socialist ideology need not ever be entertained. Furthermore, his problems are briefly medicalized when, on his first day back at the mines, he suffers a dramatic flashback reminiscent of the symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder. Instead of confronting this issue, discussing it, or featuring another psychological episode, the film simply lets it hang silently over the story, as if to excuse any guilt that could be pinned on Richard. This troublesome innocence, however, makes the reversed jeremiad possible. The ways of the father are constructed as ways that were forced upon him by a bad situation. Given the chance to be good, to follow the true, authentic, German ways of the son and of football, the father is easily redeemed.

The Function of the Reversed Jeremiad in Contemporary Germany

NARRATING REDEMPTION There is still the question of why the narrative presented in Das Wunder von Bern was advantageous for its time. It was rather popular in its release year: according to the Filmfrderungsanstalt (German Film Board), it was number two most attended domestic film

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(behind Good Bye, Lenin!) and number ten most attended film overall in Germany during 2003. Chancellor Gerhard Schrder, whose father died in the Wehrmacht, not only announced that he cried but also urged his fellow German males to loosen their macho inhibitions and join him (Bernstein 2003). Its a family film, created not for the actual fathers of the past but instead for their sons and the families of the present day. This sentiment is reinforced by Christas explanation of the suffering the family underwent without Richard, trumping his own sufferingbased behavior with the familys experiences. It is a way to deal with both what A. Dirk Moses (2007) refers to as the feelings of ambivalence that many younger postwar Germans had toward their parents as well as the intergenerational transmission of moral pollution created not through family narratives but through a collective, internationally-endorsed understanding of the guilt of being German (p. 147, 139). But to claim that Das Wunder von Bern and its reversed jeremiad simply function as a way to deal with societal memories of World War II would be shortsighted. Such a claim ignores the past twenty years of German history and the importance of football culture in Germany. Why revive the 1954 World Cup in 2003, when Ostalgie and reunification are the hot-button items? It is interesting to note that the film shows the older son, living in East Berlin, also watching the match. In that moment, it is clear that the World Cup is presented as a unifying force. Captain Fritz Walter famously cried Lets not talk about war, lets talk about football!, which could just as easily be said for discussions regarding the successes and failures of reunification (qtd. in Heinrich, 2003, p. 1494). Of course, football has also divided Germany. A match in the 1974

NARRATING REDEMPTION World Cup was played between East and West Germany (it was won by the East, although the West went on to win the title), the 1990 World Cup was played only by West German players,

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and now the German East has no Bundesliga club and former top sides such as FC Magdeburg and Dynamo Dresden play in the lower leagues, still plagued by infrastructure problems and fan violence (Bagratuni 2010). But this film pointedly does not mention, and structurally cannot mention, any of these issues. When the football announcer cries Deutschland ist Weltmeister! no directional prefix is added to the countrys name. Furthermore, the reversed jeremiad itself speaks to dealing with ones father of separation, as well. A similar narrative can be created for these sons and fathers: separation of the states as forced by outside groups, having to deal with the potential of the fathers position as one of the many inoffizielle Mitarbeiter or of capitalist Western separatist, needing to grasp a hold of a unified German identity. Again, the film shouts to the spectator that he is correct, that he has found the right way and that the past ought to come to this appropriate Germanness to be redeemed.

Conclusion German identity, Germanness, and German ways of understanding the nations difficult and sometimes atrocious - past are fraught issues. The jeremiad and the reverse jeremiad are only models through which we can try to understand the ways in which cultural documents speak to identity. They are, of course, imperfect models. Things fall through the cracks in the analysis of cultural documents and their role in the culture they represent or speak to. However, through this discussion of Das Wunder von Bern, aspects of the intersections between past and present German problems have been revealed, along with a typically German way of handling these problems. In focusing on victimization and self-support, the film exhibits aspects of German

NARRATING REDEMPTION society that ought not be ignored: the processes of redemption and the memory, the interconnectedness of multiple painful histories, a sense of a unified German people, and the troubles with and anxieties regarding certain manifestations of masculinity (which are then charged into sport). Das Wunder von Bern is, ultimately, sickly sweet and sentimental, but the

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very fact that it can hit at the very heart of the German public is telling of what it communicates.

NARRATING REDEMPTION References Filmfrderungsanstalt. (n.d.) 2003 Annual List (International). Retrieved from http://www.ffa.de

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Bagratuni, John. (2010, October 1). East German legacy lives on 20 years after unification. McClatchy - Tribune Business News. Bernstein, Richard. (2003, November 10). Berlin journal; Germanys grief and glory, wrapped up in a soccer ball. International Herald Tribune. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2003/11/10/world/berlin-journal-germany-s-grief-andglory-wrapped-up-in-a-soccer-ball.html?ref=richardbernstein Heinrich, Arthur. (2003). The 1954 soccer world cup and the Federal Republic of Germanys self-discovery. American Behavioral Scientist, 46, 1491-1505. Retrieved from http://abs.sagepub.com/ Moses, A. Dirk. (2007). Stigma and sacrifice in the Federal Republic of Germany."History & Memory, 19.2, 139-180. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublication?journalCode=histmemo Shulman, George. (1996). American political culture, prophetic narration, and Toni Morrison's Beloved. Political Theory, 24.2, 295-314. Retrieved from http://ptx.sagepub.com/ Welzer, Harald. (2005). Grandpa wasn't a Nazi: The Holocaust in German family remembrance. Internatinal Perspectives, 54, 1-30. Retrieved from http://www.ajc.org

NARRATING REDEMPTION Wortmann, Snke (Director & Producer). (2003). Das Wunder von Bern. [Motion picture]. Germany: Senator Film Produktion.

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