German films were particularly well represented at the Oscar presentation this year. They won nothing, that is, unless you count the Oscar for Austrian actor Christoph Waltz in Quentin Tarantino’s international co-production Inglourious Basterds. There was a lot of German money invested in that film and it was made at the Babelsberg Studios near Berlin, but otherwise it doesn’t really make much sense to link it in any way with German cinema. At least not if we are speaking about a national film culture. Things are somewhat the same when it comes to Michael Haneke’s The White Ribbon. That was a German production with a German theme, but made by an Austrian. However, that film also won nothing.
The Americans are not known for their strong interest in the cinema culture of other countries. This means, on the one hand, that foreign, and therefore German films, are not shown in the large multiplex cinemas across the country, but that also largely applies to so-called arthouse films made by American directors.
On the other hand, there certainly is an audience interested in films beyond the commercial Hollywood blockbusters and who is positively enthusiastic about foreign-language films – particularly in large cities on the East and West coasts. And among that audience, German cinema again has a good reputation.
As a result, series of German films – for example, of the kind shown at the Museum of Modern Art in New York or by the Goethe-Institut – are very well-attended and are closely watched by the press. German films, even awkward ones like Christian Petzold’s Jerichow, receive marvellous reviews in big-name newspapers and magazines, like The New Yorker, for example. Specialist magazines comment with great respect on German cinema, and some films, such as Maren Ade’s Alle Anderen (Everyone Else), which won a Silver Bear at the Berlinale last year and was shown at festivals in Seattle, Los Angeles and New York, even receive a multiple page spread. This sometimes occurs although a film has no official release date and possibly not even a distributor in America. An interest in German cinema is simply presupposed, although German films are not very much in evidence. And that interest is greater, the more German the film is – with German actors and a theme that promises to provide some insight into the country.
That was not always the case. The enthusiasm with which Americans followed what was happening in the so-called New German Film in the 1970s and early 1980s, and the respect they had mainly for Rainer Werner Fassbinder, a respect that he has not really been given in Germany to this very day, was followed by years of complete indifference after Fassbinder’s death. It goes without saying that this had to do with the state of German cinema. The turning point came in Germany in 1998 – one year later in America – with Tom Tykwer’s Run Lola Run. That was followed in 2001 by Sandra Nettelbeck’s Bella Martha, which became a minor arthouse success, Good Bye, Lenin! by Wolfgang Becker in 2003, and then of course Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck’s The Lives of Others, which was enthusiastically received, and not just since it received the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film of 2006. However, if you look at what films reach the silver screen, apart from those at the numerous festivals where German cinema is frequently represented, then this good reputation scarcely translates into widespread visibility.
The White Ribbon was released on January 3 in three cinemas and therefore earned very little that opening weekend: a mere 60,000 dollars, although the film had received outstanding reviews and had been awarded the Golden Palm at the film festival in Cannes in May, and although Michael Haneke was no unknown, even before the Oscar nomination. The Lives of Others was launched in nine cinemas. By comparison, the figure of twenty cinemas showing Run Lola Run sounds rather amazing. Even A Serious Man by the Coen brothers, Joel and Ethan, was screened in only six cinemas, although it was nominated for an Oscar this year. Which just shows where the problem lies – with the blockbusters that dominate the cinemas and ensure that the same films run everywhere.
So how do German films rank in America? Very highly among those who actually get to see them. But most people have no chance of seeing them.
