An intense, well-nuanced representation of East Germany

Director: Christian Petzold
Country: Germany
Run time: 105 mins

Barbara Wolf, brilliantly and subtlety acted by Nina Hoss, conveys one woman’s predicament in a small corner of a huge oppressive society. Christian Petzold’s award winning feature film entails an intimate portrait of an East German doctor from Berlin who has been exiled to a remote provincial hospital on the Baltic coast, following her visa application to join her boyfriend in the west during the Cold War era.

The punishment intensifies Barbara’s need to leave. She plans her escape swiftly while under surveillance, being cornered into a Kafkaesque world full of Stasi officials systematically searching her austere apartment, following her every move and arbitrarily subjecting her to humiliating cavity searches. Her unclassified crime is to seek permission from authorities to immigrate to West Germany, the ‘other’ bloc. 

Pervasive distrust, suffocating citizens and grey colours, while Petzold subtly playing off theclichés of East Germany, introduces impeccably crafted new angles. The political can not be separated from the personal, the very elements that cause intense hardship can indirectly give birth to fundamentals of contempt likehelping the weak from inside, cherishing emotional connections via battle against institutional quagmire.

Economic use of dialogue,long establishing shots along with a slow editing pace, Petzold’s story telling and cinematography clearly uses familiar templates from the old masters of the European ‘art movie’ genre. Layered mise-en-scene combined with immaculate camerawork are the finishing touches to take us back to the era of great ‘Auteurs’ like Michelangelo Antonioni. I just hope the European independent film scene will manage to liberate themselvesstylistically from over powering formulas of these godlike ‘auteurs’ so that they can move more freely to create their own unique style and allow themselves to evolve with time.

Regardless Barbara is an intense, well-nuanced and clever representation of 1980s East Germany. It is drama of escape, oppression and compassion.  

*Barbara screened as part of the Bermuda Documentary Weekend Series