Die Mörder sind unter uns (1946) (translated to English as The Murderers Are Among Us) was released a year after Germany surrendered to the Allied Powers in 1945. Yet its striking visuals and thematic resonance maintain a sense of timelessness. Strong performances from Hildegard Knef and Ernst Wilhelm Borchert, coupled with Wolfgang Staudte's surehanded direction, and Friedel Behn-Grund and Eugen Klagemann's outstanding cinematography and lighting make The Murderers Are Among Us a truly memorable watch.
This iconic Trümmerfilm ("rubble film") centers around two German individuals both dealing with the downfall of The Third Reich: Dr. Hans Mertens (Borchert), a military surgeon and former Nazi soldier still reeling from witnessing a massacre of over a hundred innocent people against his will on Christmas Eve of 1942, and Susanne Wallner (Knef), a painter and concentration camp survivor sharing the same apartment as him. As time passes, the two strangers grow close, and Hans eventually realizes his former Nazi captain (played by Arno Paulsen) who ordered the killings is still alive with a family and running a successful factory, without feeling any remorse for his past sins. It is at this point that Hans is faced with the moral dilemma of whether to take matters into his own hands or to leave justice to be decided by the authorities.
Part of what makes Murderers a classic of postwar German cinema is the fact that it took significant visual and thematic inspiration from the Weimar era of German Expressionist films (such as Fritz Lang's M (1931)) with dramatic shadows and an emphasis on everyday objects like broken windows, several of which the main characters find themselves staring out of with some fascinating approaches to its lighting. When Hans and Susanne peer out a broken window in their apartment, Susanne's white shirt and Hans' dark suit are stark contrasts to each other and serve as accurate representations of their outlooks on life (Susanne's is one of optimism and progressiveness, while Hans' is one of angst and lingering trauma). The broken windows also symbolize a mental and emotional prison that the protagonists find themselves behind. Those that are reminiscent of the fences and barbed wire that surrounded the Nazi concentration camps and the subsequent division and isolation felt within the Allied Powers' occupation of Nazi Germany. One interesting historical connection that Murderers shares with the Weimar era films is that The Murderers Are Among Us was Fritz Lang's original title for M before changing it mid-production.
Since Murderers was filmed and presented in black-and-white, it is easy to see where Steven Spielberg and his director of photography found visual inspiration for Schindler's List (1993), a film centered on Oskar Schindler, a wealthy German industrialist and Nazi Party member doing everything in his power and will to rescue over a thousand Jewish refugees from the Holocaust. For instance, in the opening scenes of Schindler's List (which were filmed in color) where a Jewish family is seen observing Shabbat and lighting the candles, the flame atop the candles resemble the incineration of Jews in the Nazis' furnaces. Additionally, the smoke from the candles resembles the smoke from said furnaces before the picture gradually transitions to black-and-white and match-cuts to a train letting out black smoke. In Murderers, there is a similar scene where Hans blows cigarette smoke over a chessboard with the pieces still on top of it, which is metaphorically the equivalent of the furnaces' smoke that was inhaled by the people in the vicinities. Additionally, in a later scene in Murderers, the snow falling onto the ground looks a lot like the ashes from the smoke of said furnaces. Windows also provide the audience with a brief glimmer of hope, as evidenced by one of the film's final shots, which involves the former Nazi captain insisting his innocence as his face becomes framed by shadows that resemble prison bars, reminiscent of the cells used during the Nuremberg Trials. However, the critical difference between Murderers and Schindler's List is the film's perspective. Murderers was produced from the Germans' view on the aftermath of World War II with only the briefest of implications of the Jews, whereas Schindler's List was made primarily through the eyes of the Jewish people suffering under Nazi Germany, and the lone German man who helped them escape the horrors of Auschwitz.
Murderers make for a good case study of being a harsh self-critique of Germany's history as a fallen nation due to Hitler, the Nazis, and the dictatorship that further disgraced the country in their loss of two world wars. This historical backdrop of the war and its aftermath play into the film's prominent use of shots focusing on broken windows represent the then-current state of Germany after their surrender to the Allied Powers: once beautiful and complete countries that were destroyed by the Nazis' dictatorial reign and the United States' subsequent bombing of the cities, but with the potential to be rebuilt. The windows also stand to give the characters multiple opportunities to get both a metaphorical and literal glimpse at their unrecognizably destroyed world being restored outside versus the disheveled familiarity of their homes from a time lost to history inside. Additionally, the fact that this movie was filmed in the actual ruins of Berlin adds to the gritty and realistic atmosphere present throughout the movie. However, with the numerous lingering shots of destroyed buildings as the mise-en-scène, they must have given audiences at the time a chance to think about what had just happened in recent times, like who or what to believe in, whether it was a religious or spiritual figure or new political groups that promised to reject fascism like the Soviet Union's Stalinist Party. Said party would fail to live up to the standards and ideals they initially promised, but that is another story.
On the subject of moral reflections, one character in Murderers whom the protagonists interact with is a local psychic, who at one point, when reading the mind of a shopkeeper, states that he sees "a long bridge spanning continents," which can be a religious or spiritual metaphor for a bridge or path to Heaven or Paradise, where there are no social/racial/political barriers or suffering of any kind, thus providing some audience members with the hope that a fallen nation like Germany can strive towards rebuilding themselves and eventually towards a Heaven-like state. While some may interpret the psychic character as believing in a well-intended but false hope given the dour atmosphere and this film's connection to the Soviet sector of Berlin (one of the occupying Allies who approved this film), but when seen through the bleakness of postwar Germany, a few German audience members with nothing to fall back on may have found genuine hope in that scene and encouraged them to initiate positive social change within their communities. Also, during the flashback to the day Hans witnessed the killings, the following sequences involve the Nazi officers singing Christmas carols in front of a Christmas tree inside one of their offices, and a Catholic crucifix with one of their machine guns propped up against it. Said scene is indicative of the Nazis' religious hypocrisy of claiming to represent messengers of Jesus Christ, yet dishonoring Him by placing their weapons used to kill innocent Jews and Romani citizens next to a figure of gentleness, kindness, love, and unity. As a result, the scene as mentioned earlier must have been enough for specific audience members like former Nazi Party members to justify their decision to either join alternative religious groups or reject religion as a whole, or even be emotionally persuaded to align with other political parties like communism and its ideals.
While we are still on religion and politics, The Murderers Are Among Us is an excellent film. However, it suffers from the apparent omission of the Jewish perspective during the fallout of the Holocaust and the concentration camps. The innocent lives being murdered in this movie are implied to be Jewish, but that alone makes this film skewed towards somewhat stereotyping the German citizens as misled by a fascist maniac while tiptoeing around the sensitive subject of the Jews killed in the Holocaust. The Third Reich not only lied to Germany, but they also hunted down, persecuted, and destroyed Jews, Romani, and even Christians who stood in their way as part of Adolf Hitler's agenda of promoting the Aryans' racial, ethnic, and religious superiority. The fact that this film fails to address the Holocaust adequately and instead imply that it was an event where "a lot of people died" indicates that the antisemitic sentiment was still present at the back of the German citizens' consciousness. One instance of this film's failure to address the bigger picture is when Susanne talks about her father whom she accompanied into a concentration camp, and it is left to the audience to assume that her father either had some Jewish blood in him or was incredibly vocal in his opposition to the Nazi forces.
Murderers excels as an introspective look into the everyday German citizens' lives after the war but begins to unravel towards the end when the film gradually emphasizes Christian crosses and symbolism in honor of those killed during the war. While well-intended, this comes across as not only a white-washing of the antisemitism that defined Nazi Germany but also a missed opportunity to honor the Jews persecuted and killed by the Nazis by emphasizing Jewish figures and iconography. At the same time, the presence of Christian iconography can be seen as ironic given the Soviet Union's anti-religious stance and seeing as they demanded changes to the film's ending from a revenge-centered vigilante film to a moral contemplation on taking matters into the individual's hands versus leaving justice to the legal and judicial authorities. For context, the Soviet sector of occupied Berlin granted Staudte permission to shoot his film in the city's ruins, and also requested the director to change the film's ending from Hans killing his former commanding officer to Hans being stopped by Susanne, and agreeing to let the authorities deal with him, a scene meant to promote pacifism as the ultimate path to the deliverance of moral and social righteousness.
When one of the movie's characters says, "Some injuries are invisible," it refers to Hans' emotional and psychological trauma, in addition to that of the innocent bystanders who witnessed killings like the one Hans was unable to prevent. This finds a new level of meaning when Hans is in a bar getting drunk for, at this point, he has lost all purpose for living. When Hans confronts his former captain in a hallway during his second attempt to fill the hole in his soul, his shadow looms menacingly over the captain, a thematic reversal of the captain's psychological shadow over the then-helpless doctor. When Susanne comes to Hans' rescue, it is at that point that Hans realizes that he has become no better than the Nazis whom he once served. The shadows in this film are used to dramatic effect incredibly well, especially during a scene towards the end when Hans sets out to kill his former captain, and his shadow looms behind him like his past with the Nazis, which up until this point, has haunted him every day since Germany surrendered. This references how the memory of his former captain's authority, deeds, and inhumanity follows him wherever he goes. While many films suffer when the endings are changed during post-production, The Murderers Are Among Us is a rare exception. The alternate ending used in the final cut elevates the overall picture from a suspenseful yet simple vigilante film to a grim yet hopeful story of nonviolent redemption and criminal justice. Had the director stuck with his original ending, I don't think this film would have had the same emotional impact as it did. Regardless of how the film may have turned out with the original ending, this film's moral triumph comes through when Hans and Susanne walk off together, knowing that it is not up to the individual to seek vengeance, but rather the authorities of judicial and criminal justice who are responsible for delivering moral righteousness to the oppressed.
In conclusion, while the writing for the characters are somewhat lacking given the historical context of the film tropes of the day (the men having all the emotional arcs, and the women being their emotional support), The Murderers Are Among Us' message about rebuilding oneself from the ashes of destruction stands the test of time. As one of the first movies approved for filming after the collapse of The Third Reich in 1945, this movie is exceptionally well-made regardless of the creative choices made for the characters and the Soviets' interference with the ending. Through films, Germany was brainwashed into supporting a racist and xenophobic regime that murdered millions of innocent Jews, Romani, and Germans opposed to the party's message. After the war, Germany was able to repurpose the same art form used to turn people against each other and rehabilitate them to reject the Nazi propaganda programmed into their subconsciousness. The timeless themes from this movie reminded audiences of the day about the judicial process and patience required for their homes, towns, cities, and country to make a complete comeback as a stable economic and political example to the world. While Germany's political and sociological journey was far from over as the seeds for the Cold War between the Soviets and their Eastern Bloc against the United States and their Western Bloc were being simultaneously planted, films like Murderers provided German audiences with not only a chance to question their former alliances, but also an emotionally haunting albeit biased experience that both inspired and provoked them never to forget the past, but move forward from the ruins of their own making. While no one can predict the political and social changes that will inevitably occur within the next few years/decades, I can say this about The Murderers Are Among Us with confidence: if Germany can rebound from the lowest of lows, maybe a country like the United States can too.
Comments