The Wave
2009 ‘Die Welle’ Directed by Dennis Gansel
Synopsis
A school teacher discusses types of government with his class. His students find it too boring to repeatedly go over national socialism and believe that dictatorship cannot be established in modern Germany. He starts an experiment to show how easily the masses can become manipulated.
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Keswick Film Festival review #5
'The Wave', or 'Die Welle' in German (incidentally not the title of the next 'Die Hard' film) tells the tale of a teacher (played by an exceptional Jürgen Vogel) named 'Rainer Wenger', who is quickly referred to as 'Herr Wenger'. Said teacher, who would rather teach anarchism in a project week, instead gets stuck with autocracy. His class doesn't believe that a Dictatorship could be possible in modern day Germany, so 'Wenger' begins an experiment to demonstrate how much his students can be manipulated in the space of the week.
The students, all played brilliantly by Frederick Lau, Max Riemelt and Jennifer Ulrich amongst others, are soon copying a salute, wearing a white shirt uniform…
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Rainer Wenger is a chasmastic but headstrong Politics teacher. Being an ex-anarchist, he’s relishing teaching a week long class on Anarchy but instead is given the Autocracy class. As he reluctantly starts probing the class to find out what they know about the subject it becomes obvious that warnings of the danger of fascism and the Third Reich have been rammed down these kids throats so much that it’s become meaningless to them, just another thing to be apathetic about. Rainer asks the class whether they think something like the Third Reich could happen again and the kids dismiss it out of hand so, out of anger and spite at being told to teach this class, Rainer decides to start…
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Based on Ron Jones' social experiment, but it feels agonizingly fake. The entire ordeal is full of unlikable characters and artificial situations. The ending is powerful and shows the underlying strengths of the story, but until then it is pseudo-political crap.
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A group of students in a special projects 'Autocracy' class are asked the question is it possible a fascist dictatorship could rise to power in Germany again.
The group in the confines of the classroom discuss some of the factors that could lead to autocracy and it's not long before the group, equipped with a set of rules, a uniform and a name has taken on a life of it's own.
Interesting and thought provoking film based on a real life experiment that took place in the US in the late 1960's.
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Basada en un suceso en Alemania en el año 1967 cuenta como un profesor hace un experimento con sus alumnos, un experimento que demuestra que una sociedad inteligente puede volverse (a pesar de si hay gente brillante en el) todos pueden volverse así como un clan seguido por las ordenes del profesor, así sea que están bien o no lo estén. Me pareció muy interesante y le doy esa calificación porque todo lo ocurrido en esta película puede sucederle a cualquiera y el realismo me gusta mucho en las películas.
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It's an interesting idea, fascism taking over the school but having them not notice it. The problem is it was so transparent from the start that it kind of defeats the purpose of the movie. A friend asked me what I was watching as it looked like 'some future Nazi film' which was a good observation. I had a thing against authority as a teen and I would have spotted what he was doing, called him out on it and disrupted the class. It does raise an interesting discussion and had I watched it in a school history class (where I imagine it's played on loop) then I might have liked it better.
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Los seres humanos somos estúpidos, y seguiremos tropezando con las mismas piedras una y otra vez.
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It's usually the case that the best way to get a message across to viewers of a film is to display the negative qualities of the contrary, rather than attempt to shove in the face of the viewer just how great your side of the argument is. The Wave is good proof of this, as it preaches the case for humanism by showing just how dangerous and infectious fascism is, even on a minimised scale. I'm a sucker for films about cults/manipulation/etc. so this is right up my street and the film didn't disappoint. While it could've used some extra work both in the script and in the direction, it works where it counts and gets the message across to…
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This review reportedly contains spoilers. I can handle the truth.
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Basada en un suceso en Alemania en el año 1967 cuenta como un profesor hace un experimento con sus alumnos, un experimento que demuestra que una sociedad inteligente puede volverse (a pesar de si hay gente brillante en el) todos pueden volverse así como un clan seguido por las ordenes del profesor, así sea que están bien o no lo estén. Me pareció muy interesante y le doy esa calificación porque todo lo ocurrido en esta película puede sucederle a cualquiera y el realismo me gusta mucho en las películas.
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I am now fluent in German.
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En mi top ten de películas de zombies
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A movie demonstrating the ease in which people are willing to fall into line with fascism. A must see.
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Based on Ron Jones' social experiment, but it feels agonizingly fake. The entire ordeal is full of unlikable characters and artificial situations. The ending is powerful and shows the underlying strengths of the story, but until then it is pseudo-political crap.
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