Der Unhold (1996)

User Rating:

7.1/10   

Director:

Volker Schlöndorff

Writers:

Michel Tournier (novel)
Jean-Claude Carrière (writer) ...

Release Date:

12 September 1996 (Germany)

Genre:

Drama

Plot:

Frenchman Abel Tiffauges likes children, and wants to protect them against the grown-ups. Falsely suspected as child molester...

Plot Keywords:

Children | Boy | Castle | Frenchman | Hunting

Awards:

1 win & 1 nomination

Cast

John Malkovich	...	Abel Tiffauges
Gottfried John	...	Chief Forrester
Marianne Sägebrecht	...	Mrs. Netta
Volker Spengler	...	Fieldmarshall Hermann Goering
Heino Ferch	...	SS Officer Raufeisen
Dieter Laser	...	Prof. Blaettchen
Agnès Soral	...	Rachel
Sasha Hanau	...	Martine
Vernon Dobtcheff	...	Lawyer
Simon McBurney	...	Brigadier
Ilja Smoljanski	...	Ephraim
Luc Florian	...	Prisoner-of-War
Laurent Spielvogel	...	Prisoner-of-War
Marc Duret	...	Prisoner-of-War
Philippe Sturbelle	...	Prisoner-of-War

Also Known As:

Le roi des aulnes (France)
The Ogre

Runtime:

118 min

Country:

France | Germany | UK

Language:

English | German | French

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

Stereo

Certification:

Iceland:12 | Singapore:PG | Germany:12 (w) | Portugal:M/12 | Spain:18 | Australia:M

Filming Locations:

Malbork, Poland

Company:

Canal+

Goofs:

Errors made by characters (possibly deliberate errors by the filmmakers): Prior to the school fire, a caption says "Paris 1925". Upon his arrest as an adult, Abel, through his narration, remembers the fire as having happened "twenty years ago". This would place his adult scenes in 1945, but when he joins the French army after his arrest it is before the German occupation of Paris which would place his arrest in 1940. However, Abel is slow-witted and possibly does not have an accurate sense of time.

Quotes:

Prof. Blaettchen: Brightness is not a characteristic of the German race. We don't want brightness! People say, "Oh, so-and-so is so bright, he has such a clear mind!" No. We mistrust this brightness, this clarity. Let the new African races cultivate brightness. Our sources are in darkness. That is what drives us to unparalleled creativity.

Original, featuring a fine performance by Malkovich

This strange and original work is a French film about Nazi Germany done in English. There are no subtitles. Director Volker Schlondorff is German, the screenplay is by veteran French writer Jean-Claude-Carriere, who has scores of films to his credit including Bell de Jour (1967) and Valmont (1989), and the star is the American, John Malkovich, who plays a French simpleton named Abel Tiffauges who ends up as a servant in Field Marshall Herman Goering's hunting estate during World War II, and then later in a Hitler youth academy for boys.

Malkovich's Abel is enormously sympathetic because he has suffered but harbors no bitterness, because he genuinely loves children, and because he has a certain magic about him based on his childish belief that somehow he will survive any catastrophe. In a boy's home as a child he survives the brutality of a proto Goering-like fat boy, and then later as an auto mechanic he overcomes a false accusation of child molestation. Both of these little stories are vividly rendered and seem entirely realistic. Then begins Abel's war time adventures, and it is here that the story becomes, as some have observed, something of a fairy tale. Abel is able to leave his barracks at the prison to wander about where he meets a blind moose and then a German army officer at a deserted cabin in the woods. This leads to his being established at Goering's hunting estate, and from there to the Hitler youth academy where he is treated as a privileged servant. We see the Nazis as just another part of the bizarre personages of his world.

The depiction of Goering as a kind of self-indulgent Nero, living in opulence as the world burns, seemed entirely believable. The overall portrait of the Germans in an objective and balanced manner was refreshing and thought-provoking and one of the strengths of the film. The Nazi eugenicist is contrasted with the officer who was part of a failed plot against Hitler, both men enormously sincere and dedicated, the one unbalanced, the other unlucky.

This is not a film for those looking primarily to be entertained. This is a work of art, dark, uneven, and a bit curious.