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Article
Author(s)
Farhat Tasannum Farah
Full-Text PDF XML 286 Views
DOI:10.17265/2159-5542/2019.03.003
Affiliation(s)
American International University-Bangladesh, Dhaka, Bangladesh
ABSTRACT
The
powerful ability of film to present the traumatized German war veteran that
traces how some of the most vulnerable members of society, marginalized and
persecuted as ‘enemies of the nation,’ attempted to regain authority over their
own minds and reclaim the authentic memory of the Great War under Weimar
Germany and the Third Reich. The mentally disabled survivor of the trenches
became a focus of debate between competing social and political groups, each
attempting to construct their own versions of the national community and the
memory of the war experience. By examining the psychological effects of war on
ordinary Germans and the way these war victims have shaped perceptions of
madness and mass violence, the expressionist cinema explores how the classical
German cinema of the Weimar Republic was haunted by the horrors of World War I
and the the devastating effects of the nation's defeat. This paper purposes to analyse how this
post-traumatic cinema transformed extreme psychological states into visual
expression; how it pushed the limits of cinematic representation with its
fragmented story lines, distorted perspectives, and stark lighting; and how it
helped create a modernist film language that anticipated film noir and remains
incredibly influential today.
KEYWORDS
Great War, trauma, Germans, cinematic representation, German Expressionist Films
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