Der Baader Meinhof Komplex (2008)

User Rating:

7.4/10   

Director:

Uli Edel

Writers:

Stefan Aust (book)
Uli Edel (collaboration)

Release Date:

25 September 2008 (Germany)

Genre:

Action | Biography | Crime | Drama | History

Plot:

A look at Germany's terrorist group, The Red Army Faction (RAF), which organized bombings, robberies, kidnappings and assassinations in the late 1960s and '70s. Based on Stefan Aust's best-selling nonfiction book.

Plot Keywords:

Terrorist | 1960s | Bomb | Kidnapping | Police

Awards:

Nominated for Oscar. Another 2 wins & 6 nominations

Cast

Martina Gedeck	...	Ulrike Meinhof
Moritz Bleibtreu	...	Andreas Baader
Johanna Wokalek	...	Gudrun Ensslin
Nadja Uhl	...	Brigitte Mohnhaupt
Jan Josef Liefers	...	Peter Homann
Stipe Erceg	...	Holger Meins
Niels-Bruno Schmidt	...	Jan Carl Raspe
Vinzenz Kiefer	...	Peter-Jürgen Boock
Simon Licht	...	Horst Mahler
Alexandra Maria Lara	...	Petra Schelm
Hannah Herzsprung	...	Susanne Albrecht
Tom Schilling	...	Josef Bachmann
Daniel Lommatzsch	...	Christian Klar
Sebastian Blomberg	...	Rudi Dutschke
Eckhard Dilssner	...	Horst Bubeck

Also Known As:

The Baader Meinhof Complex (International: English title) (UK) (USA)
La bande à Baader (France)

Runtime:

150 min | Germany:180 min (approx.) (TV version)

Country:

Germany | France | Czech Republic

Language:

German | English | French | Swedish

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Certification:

Germany:12 | Czech Republic:12 | Sweden:15 | Norway:15 | Denmark:15 | Ireland:15A | UK:18 | Switzerland:16 (canton of Geneva) | Switzerland:16 (canton of Vaud) | Netherlands:16 | France:U | Italy:VM14 | Portugal:M/16 | Hong Kong:III | South Korea:18 | Singapore:M18 | Japan:R-15

Filming Locations:

Bavaria-Ateliers, Geiselgasteig, Grünwald, Bavaria, Germany

Company:

Constantin Film Produktion

Trivia:

As an immediate reaction to the movie, Ignes Ponto, widow of Jürgen Ponto, whose assassination is portrayed in the movie, returned her Federal Cross of Merit. She was angry that the Federal Republic of Germany has never even created a memorial for victims of the RAF, but instead helped to finance films like this one about the members of the RAF. Also, she said, she had not been warned about the graphic portrayal of Ponto's assassination when she was invited to the movie premiere and felt humiliated by the producers for making her sit through this without a warning. About a month later, she filed a lawsuit against the producers of the movie, who claimed that every scene is historically accurate, because the assassination of her husband, which she had to witness from the next room, was not portrayed as it happened. She demands the scene of the murder of her husband to be cut from the movie. The filmmakers claim that they had tried to contact her during production to get the scene right but Ignes Ponto had no desire to cooperate. Before this movie, there had been no portrayal of Ponto's assassination on film and she felt the staging of the movie was lurid and dishonoring to her husband. So far, no decision has been reached about the lawsuit.

Goofs:

Anachronisms: The Deep Purple song "Child In Time" is played when the movie takes place in 1969. "Child In Time" is from the album "In Rock", and this album was released in 1970.

Quotes:

Brigitte Mohnhaupt: Stop seeing them the way they weren't.

Movie Connections:

Featured in "Guinness World Records - Die größten Weltrekorde: (#5.1)" (2008)

Soundtrack:

Child in Time

Clear, honest, simple, radiant; one of the best political films I've seen

Brilliant film about the Baader-Meinhof group, i.e. one of the most active modern terrorist groups. The film starts with showing people peacefully demonstrating against the Shah of Iran and his wife who were visiting Western Germany in the late 60s; on signal, supporters of the Shah and the police rush and senselessly beat demonstrators into pulp. The imagery is one that will not soon leave my mind, being extremely reminiscent of what happened in the G8 protests at Genoa and Gothenburg about 30 years later. Back to the film: the leftist movement is at this time very much against the police state that Western Germany has become. As the hippie 60s obviously didn't help much with turning things around, the early 70s - brought on by with the assassinations of Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy, the US carrying on their war in Vietnam with Nixon coming into power and the West German government was being accused for merely being a puppet in the hands of imperialist America, some people wanted to turn things around without using flowers and kind words. These people were seriously convinced that the word was revolution, and used kidnapping, bombs and bullets for change. This film is the story of the core of the Baader-Meinhof group, and it's close to the best political cinema I've ever seen; the direction, the acting, the script, the editing and the music...it's as if the make-up is washed away from how political films usually are, leaving the viewer to decide what's right and wrong. It's interesting to see how the Baader-Meinhof group works as the members are increasingly isolated and brain-wash each other by simply interacting with their hardcore ideals as the base. Brilliant and highly recommendable, of course no matter what your personal political ideas are.