White Ribbon

There are some great black and white films out there. Some of these are from an age where color wasn’t a possibility, like those from the thirties, forties, and fifties or even earlier. Then there are those films who use black and white for budgetary or aesthetic choices and those can be seen from the seventies through present day. There was a film made in the past fifteen years, directed by a great Austrian director. A film made as a warning to us all, depicting a small village, in a time just before The War to End All Wars. A film which is challenging, beautiful, haunting, and brilliant, and a winner of one of the most prestigious prizes in cinema.

So if you’re like me and you enjoy film and the impact and emotions they convey, then grab a glass of your preferred liquid and join me for the next little while. For me that’s a bottle of Always Hazy, from our friends at Saranac in Utica, New York. So sit back, relax, and let’s talk about the love of film. Welcome to Glazed Cinema.

I first heard about our subject today while shopping for films at Target in the New Releases section. I remember when I saw it, the cover drew me in. It was a black and white cover featuring the backs of children walking outside. They were dressed in period garments and seemed to have just walked through an archway, which was adorned with garland and a bell. The text read The White Ribbon and on the side was the stamp of the Palme D'Or. I bought it that day and when I got home I looked up a press release from the Cannes Film Festival. The legendary film festival was announcing its award winners of 2009. Among the films entered I saw a list of directors I loved among the year's selection. Names included Steven Soderbergh, Lars Von Trier, Quentin Tarantino, and in Chan Park-Wook. The Palme D'Or went to the director of our subject today. As a director I had never heard of up to that point however, this made me even more curious. Who is this director, Michael Haneke and how good is this move, to have beaten out the other names I recognized more?

The White Ribbon is a film that takes place in the early 20th century around the time just before World War One. It tells the story of an Austrian village in which a series of unexpected accidents occur. One after the other, the severity of these accidents increases with each passing event. With the events coinciding with the visit from

the Baron and Baroness, the town is besides themselves. With no real leads as to who is behind the events the town adapts with watchful eyes, although there are suspicions as to who is behind them.

Shot completely in black and white using a digital/film camera, the look harkens back to cinema of old. A style choice used to reflect the subject’s time period among other reasons, it has a great look with crisp visuals. There are some great camera angles and shots in this film as the cinematographer name did some great work here. Like other works of Haneke, however, the shots are usually static and feature longer takes with not a whole lot of movement.

Michael Haneke is an Austrian born director, who has been making movies for over two decades. All of this director’s films live in a sort of uncomfortable realm. I liken his story telling in some ways to Von Trier in that they like the more challenging subjects and they like to push both the boundaries of cinema and their audiences. Obviously the level of this un-comfortability fluctuates from film to film. The White Ribbon shares this common thread, depicting uncomfortable subjects like abuse and molestation, so be warned if those are trigger subjects for you. With those present however, it is certainly more tame than some of his other films of the past like Funny Games for instance.

There are a number of important characters in this film, with whom we follow. The most prevalent character is of course, the narrator. The narrator is the voice of an older man and he describes certain events and sets the scenes we witness. We can tell from the manner in which he speaks that he is remembering events from his youth. The school teacher, played by Christian Friedel is one of the main characters and someone who we follow throughout. The school teacher is the narrator at a young age. As the schoolteacher, he teaches the children their studies and is the most relatable character in the film, at least for me. He also develops a relationship with a woman in town named Eva. The children he teaches collectively are another group of characters in the film we follow, particularly the pastor’s children Klara, Martin, and Gustav. Each child is of a different age and thus are experiencing different things in their lives. For instance Gustav, the youngest is an innocent young boy while Martin is in a pubescent period, while Klara the oldest of the three is the leader of the pack. The pastor himself is the last of these key characters. He is a very regimented man who seems to have little room for niceties and takes the cloth, rules, and his faith very seriously.

One aspect of this film that I find quite interesting is the contradiction and hypocrisy. It is sprinkled throughout this film and at times it can be subtly suggested, but for the most part it is glaringly obvious as Haneke wants us to take note of it. Even the narrator unraveling the tale somewhat contradicts himself when he says “I don’t know if all the details of the story I’m going to tell you are true, a lot of it is hearsay.” The reason I find this particularly interesting here is because of its usage and meaning. Hypocrisy can provide many different outcomes depending on the delivery. It can provide humor, drama, intrigue, or horror simply by the circumstances surrounding the paradox itself. In this film its harbored in different ways. In some cases its shocking and terrible, in others its confusing, and other times revealing. It's a great theme that he wields at throughout the movie, sometimes at the perfect moments.

Apart from the contradictions there is something boiling under the surface of this film. The village that is depicted is emaculate, surrounded by beautiful scenes of nature and wildlife, however not everything is as idlic as it seems. There is a sort of allegory at work here, that tells of a dangerous mindset and power dynamic. At times it is very subtly hinted at, but it's something that deserves our attention. Through the setting of the village we get the sense that power is shifting and malevolence is rising, signaling some kind of impending doom. I found it as a warning on many levels. It's a warning that children are listening and paying attention, even when you think they are not. A warning that any ideology can be twisted into something terrible and harmful. This play on allegory makes The White Ribbon much more than what it seems and more universal than the time and place it depicts. Haneke himself put it best in an interview at the Cannes film festival in which he stated,

“To my mind, it’s a film…at least what I was aiming to do…I wanted to make a film where you understand that any ideal is corrupted as soon as you take it to the absolute extreme. If you only talk about this problem of fascism because it is a German film, it is a bit too easy for audiences in other countries to say it is a film about a German problem. I think it is a film about a problem that concerns everybody."

This film has a bit of mystery to it, which is deliberate and extremely well done. This mystery is not a whodunit, Columbo type of mystery however. The goal of the movie is not to find the culprit and see justice done. In trying to write about this without spoiling anything I decided to leave it to one of the masters, Roger Ebert. In a review of the film he wrote,

"Haneke's genius is to embed these possibilities in films rooted in the daily lives of ordinary people. He denies us the simple solutions of most films, in which everything is settled by the violent victory of one side. His films are like parables, teaching that bad things sometimes happen simply because they . . . happen. The universe laughs at man's laws and does what it will."

Well said Mr. Ebert, well said.

There are some great moments, sequences, and scenes in this film, but one of my favorites is when the school teacher and Eva are venturing out together. Riding in a horse and buggy, Eva asks where they are going, to which he exclaims that they are going for a picnic by the water. Looking a little uncomfortable she asks to not go, to which he states that he did not have any inappropriate intentions and agrees to turn around, stating, "How could I disagree with my future wife?" As he prompts the horse to begin walking to turn around Eva's face slowly turns to a smile as she stops him again, to thank him. I like that scene for a lot of reasons. I like the happy, relaxed nature, the respect for Eva shown, and as a hopeless romantic I like that the two are hitting it off. It also adds a nice bit of reprieve within the story as well, which is also nice.

The first time I watched The White Ribbon I had a sense that this was a great film. I could explain why in the tangible sense, but not so much in the intangible. I mean, sure the cinematography, acting, writing, and pacing was perfect, but I had a harder time explaining what it made me feel for some reason. It‘s a rather haunting finished piece that has a way of affecting the viewer. For me it digested slowly, conjuring up visuals days later, like memories of taste after a good meal. Like a fine whisky, the more I sat with it, the more it impressed me. That's when I know a film is great. If I'm revisiting it, playing moments and themes over in my head days, sometimes weeks afterward, it's a great work of art. I enjoy things that I can watch and forget, but I love and respect things that make me think and feel,

When I watched it the second time I saw it in a more refined light and it confirmed for me even more that this was a great work of art. There is a lot going on on this film and quite a bit to take in upon first viewing. For the casual viewer you may miss things upon first viewing, however do not fret, for the things you do see are more than enough to peak interest.

At the time this came out in 2009 I felt that this was a special movie, one that I felt deserved attention. Today, the sentiment is the same…this movie deserves to be talked about and seen. That’s not to say it wasn’t recognized as being great for it was, but I feel it doesn’t get mentioned as much in film circles as it should. That may be in part because Haneke's work is not easily taken in as other directors. It might also be due to his film that followed, titled Amour, which also won Best Picture in 2012. It‘s rare that a director wins the Palme D’Or, let alone twice, and even rarer that they win it with back to back films. However that is a distinction Haneke can be proud to have credited to his name.

While I didn’t know the director’s name prior to going into this film, Michael Haneke entered my list of directors to discover more of. In my personal opinion The White Ribbon is among the best art films made within the past fifteen years. If you are unfamiliar with The White Ribbon I recommend pressing play on this film, especially if you’re a fan of the more artful side of cinema.

If you’d like to watch The White Ribbon you can find it on a variety of streaming services. At the time of this recording you can find it on Prime Video, Vudu, Google Play, Apple TV for either $2.99 or $3.99 to rent.

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