Nirgendwo in Afrika

There are lots of movies set in Africa. Few come anywhere close to showing the beauty as this movie does. But it is only a backdrop. The plot is captivating and the acting superb.

Having grown up in Kenya, I found the authenticity to be astounding. The use of appropriate languages was mind-blowing. There was not a word spoken that was in German for the sake of the audience -- If it would have been said in swahili, it was; English, in English.

Few movies make quite the impression on me as this one. I seldom watch movies with subtitles, so it took a bit to get used to it, but I think it was better in German than it would have been if it were dubbed.

Having just watched one of the most visually stunning and beautifully acted pieces of cinema in my long and varied life, I can only find praise for every facet of this fabulous tale. All of the pieces came together with a genuine and sincere feel for the period and the people. No fair-minded lover of the cinema can fault this production, it is simply right in every category and every magical frame. The only film so far this year to earn a 10/10 from me. Highly recommended and a tribute to ALL those involved.

When it comes to films about the Nazi racism, Nowhere in Africa is in a class by itself. Unlike Schindler's List and a plethora of screenplays on the subject, all of which confine the drama to the morality of good and evil, some with didactic overtones, others with pure shock value, or both, this movie illuminates, both with a spotlight, and a microscope, the social origins of racism. Here's the problem: The very institutions that teach right from wrong, that inculcate tribal loyalty, patriotism, and social identity, that teach us to pledge allegiance and follow the golden rule, have also quietly inferred, or noisily demanded, that the `other,' the `alien amongst us' in Biblical terms, is both different, and inferior. Every culture, Herodotus observed, thinks its own system of values superior to the values of others. If this is true (and I think it is), the subtext is clear: `others' are inferior. Which leads one to ask: Is it possible to have a moral, socialized populace without racism, or, at least, ethnocentrism?

Set in Kenya during World War II, the drama devolves around the struggles of an expatriate family of German Jews. Culturally, intellectually, and socially, they are Germans, not Jews, which is both fascinating, and historically accurate. Like many other Jews of their generation, the expatriate family viewed their Jewish heritage with both skepticism, and as a sentimental indulgence. Unable to come to grips with the events in Europe, reeling from and their new social status of being nobodies in the middle of nowhere, they struggle as social nomads, stuck between their privileged position as white overlords of the native Blacks, and their fallen, uncertain status as guests without rights. We watch the internal dynamics of a Jewish expatriate family through the prism of its own internalized assumptions, both as highly cultured Germans, and increasingly as Jews. And what they discover about their own hidden assumptions, their ethnocentrism and European sense of privilege and superiority, becomes as shocking to them as Hitler's Germany.

Like every other archetypal hero, being nobody in the middle of nowhere is the crucible that produces the Hero's special character, where he or she eventually returns home, in the end, bearing gifts, wisdom, and a healing balm. In the end, they emerge with real gem of a prize: they understand, both intellectually and emotionally, the comparative advantage of other cultures and societies.

What I especially loved about this film is its emotional tone. It's an emotionally evocative film, though not with the mawkish, childish paroxysms of a Disney flick. We watch adults dealing with culturally layered adult emotions, unwrapping and examining each layer as one peels an onion. Their collective emotional journey is as rich and textured and subtly presented as any I've seen.

This film was a surprise. It presents us a family that escape the horrors they foresaw coming in Germany to an uncertain future in Africa. The film as directed by Caroline Link, based on a novel by Stephanie Zweig, presents us with a family of survivors who will cling to life by going out of their world into the great unknown and a continent away.

In Germany the Redlich family is upper middle class. The household is filled with people going about their lives in an elegant way. That is until Walter and Jettel Redlich decide to leave it all behind to start a new life in Africa, thus avoiding a certain death.

Walter and Jettel stick out like sore thumbs in the rural part of Kenya where they go. Walter has never done any kind of manual labor, or Jettel, for that matter. Little Regina, who is a sweet and curious girl, feels right at home from the beginning. Children will adapt more easily than grown ups.

The Redlichs are lucky when Owuor arrives. They employ him right away. He is kindness personified; he turns out to be indispensable for all of them. When Walter loses the first post, the family has to relocate to another farm helped by the benevolent Susskind; his attraction to Jettel is evident, but he is too decent to take advantage of the situation.

The many difficulties are overcome because Jettel turns out to be the strongest person in this family. She is played by Juliane Kohler with gusto. She makes us feel she is this woman in the midst of a harsh place fighting all kinds of obstacles in order to survive in the new country.

The setting feels like the Africa of the 30s and 40s when it was a white man's paradise. This is the Africa where genocides will occur later on, as different nations will try to gain independence and some governments will practice what made this family flee Nazi Germany in the first place.

Based on a true story, a Jewish family escapes Nazi Germany and relocates to Kenya. Traumatic at first, then the family discovers a new way of life to be not without its rewards.

Listening from a portable radio in Africa about the details of Jewish holocaust is somewhat confining but a wonderful way of providing emotional tension central to this story. Instead of being witness to visceral aspects of the war, we are left to examine the resilience of human spirit and infinite possibilities of life. Vast and captivating African sceneries are not only beautiful but also gives spiritual lift that guide the family along their journey. Caroline Link does not discover new territories with this traditionally-told melodrama but succeeds in making "Nowhere in Africa" a timeless and moving film.