Die Patriotin

As a Film Studies post-graduate student, I have just had to endure Kluge's The Patriot. Teachers of film will tell you that this is a good film. There may be others out there who perhaps hold this film in high regard.... but alas, I am not one of them. I would like to give a detailed account of what the film is actually about, explaining the highs and lows of this German spectacle, but I cannot. After its two hour running time I was at a loss...and still am. It is a jumbled mess of documentary and fiction which involves a confused and disillusioned German history teacher and a talking knee......I will repeat that, a talking knee. Anything profound and informative that the film attempts to convey is lost due to the simple reason that it is so mind numbingly boring that you will be thinking about your dinner before you start questioning the subject of German history. The boredom is then accompanied by confusion. If you are still with the film after a bizarre peeping-tom incident then well done. If you are actually on board when the film presents a still shot of a woman inside a cow, then I salute you....but most of us normal folk will be lost. You leave the film scratching your head, wondering where the last two hours of your life have gone.