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A Love In Germany

A Love In Germany

In class we viewed an interesting piece of film that displayed the life and cultural context of living under the Nazi regime, "A Love in Germany". When reading books, such as Koonz's The Nazi Conscience, Gellately and Stoltzfus' Social Outsiders in Nazi Germany, and Peukert's Inside Nazi Germany, you can gather historical facts and concepts that go into great detail about the Nazi regime. However with films such as "A Love in Germany", you see these facts and accounts play out. It is one thing to be aware of history, it is entirely another to view it as a reality that existed with people not unlike ourselves. This film in particular demonstrates the life of an Aryan German, not the harsh treatment of the Jews or the brutality of warfare. It shows a glimpse of the lives of the people under the regime that it supported and governed, something that is often ignored and overlooked. This account displayed certain issues in particular, ones that effected Germans' personal love affair. The Nazi regime was founded on inequality, not just for race, but for gender as well. This film and the readings come together to paint a picture of how ordinary people, like ourselves, were subjected to the strict and often bizarre laws within the Reich.
"A Love in Germany" is based around the love affair of a women, Paulina, and a man, Stanislaus. There has been countless movies about this topic, but not of this nature. From the initial scenes of film, you can see the atmosphere of an ordinary German town during its time. Swastikas are present everywhere and the citizens greet each other with "Hail Hitler." This government has intruded itself into the sovereignty of this place. The town is run with a sense of structure and order. The man in charge is an SS Nazi official named Mayer, a friendly man that knows the people well. It is this sense of community that was stressed in The Nazi Conscience, the notion that Germans will work together for their...