En colère

A real sucker for any sort of German film (yes, even a television one), I was very pleased to encounter Wut being shown here on Irish television. Claiming to deal with themes of racism and identity within society, I happily sat back to watch.

Can is a Turkish teen living in Germany. One of two sons living with his elderly father, he is something of a mischief maker. He supplies drugs to the notably better off Felix, achieving laughs and entertainment at the expense of the upper class boy. Eventually, Felix's father learns of Can's escalating bullying of his son, and steps in to stop it.

Wut effectively portrays racial and class barriers in modern German society. The interaction between Felix and Can is fully believable, Can's sinister aura wonderfully hair-raising. Key to the film, the anti- hero is given humanity: a very powerful device which allows us to sympathise with him to a degree, giving us much to think about and forcing us to question the actions of some of the "more moral" characters we might traditionally find ourselves rooting for. The father's gradual realisation that he is all but powerless to stop the oppressive gang leader is an idea well conveyed by the emasculated performance of August Zirner. Felix's slow but steady idolisation of the powerful alpha-male who acts with far more paternal influence and masculinity than his father ever could has us biting our nails and worrying uneasily where the story will take us. Its eventual twists and turns are unforeseen, shocking, and tangibly dramatic, leading us to an interesting climax. In itself, however, the climax is somewhat lacking and flawed, though intriguing. The film achieves its intention, successfully acting as a catalyst to consideration, but not without bumps along the way.

Though marred by certain problems and not consistently gripping, Wut does encourage us to consider the message at its heart. The true appeal of the film lies in Felix's falling for the serpentine hissings of Can, fuelled by his disillusion with the world around him. Quite enjoyable as a whole, you could find far worse ways to spend time than watching Wut.

'Rage' ('Wut') is a film made for German TV about Turks in Germany. It was written and directed by a man born in Turkey who has lived in Germany most of his life and studied film-making there, just as the younger winner of the top prize in Berlin in 2004, Faith Akin of 'Head-On' ('Gegen die Wind'), was trained in the arts in Germany but identifies with the Turkish minority. While Akin's approach is complex and ironic, Aladag treats the German-Turkish conflicts schematically and simplistically.

Can (Oktay Özdemir) (pronounced like "John") is a cocky young Turk with bad teeth and a ponytail who is beating up and extorting money from Felix Laub (Robert Höler), a "nice" German boy on a daily basis. When Can Steals Felix's expensive sneakers his father Simon (August Zirner) finds out what has been going on and gets very angry.

The practical question is: what do you do in such a situation, since any action against Can and his gang might lead to reprisals? Felix may be wise to take the beatings and give the money, but he's in a dangerous situation. And Can, of course, is full of rage, and that's why tormenting Felix provides him with so much pleasure. Needless to say, there are other ways of expressing rage, like growing up and trying to campaign for one's rights. But 'Rage' simply exists within a context of the failure of Germany's "guest worker" program and the roiling discontent of the large Turkish minority of which both Can and Felix are victims.

'Rage' skewers middle class liberal German families that try to be "nice," aren't overtly racist toward the large Turkish population, and turn the other cheek when they are attacked, due in part in Simon's case, to what his son calls his "Hitler complex." Felix's father Simon (August Zirner) is a university philosophy teacher (soon to be promoted to full professor) who dates his young girl students, and his mother Christa (Corinna Harfouch) sells real estate and is having an affair with one of Simon's best friends. The film suggests middle class German liberals are spineless and morally weak; and in a sense questions Simon's masculinity, or at least his physical courage (though not Felix's). (Simon fails again and again to control Can and late in the picture is barely saved from committing an act of terrible cowardice, but still ends by exacting revenge.) Presumably there are more things in Heaven and earth than are dreamt of in Simon's philosophy, and these include knowing how to give someone "a good hiding," as the subtitles somewhat primly put it. He eventually gets Michael (Ralph Herforth) -- who he is soon to discover is his wife's current lover -- to deliver the "hiding" to Can for him. Can's behavior is so provocative -- the film itself is nothing if not provocative, at the cost of subtlety and even believability -- that one wonders if they have court orders in Germany. The Turkish guy not only is a danger to Felix, but enters his parents' house repeatedly and menaces and abuses them and breaks things.

But before things get that far, Simon goes to Can's apartment and asks his father, an older man, to make Can return the sneakers. Can brings them right away, in a bag, but this is when he first enters the Laubs' house and prances around abusing and mocking them. One wonders if Aladag hasn't spent some time studying the films of Michael Haneke. The climactic sequence in which Can gets really nasty seems as if it may owe a good deal to Haneke's 1997 'Funny Games.' In that, a pair of punks torment a family and make them play sadistic games with each other. Can is accused of only being brave when with his fellow punks, but in fact he does very well on his own. The young actor, Oktay Özdemir, deserves credit for playing with great boldness and conviction. On the other hand the German principals are cardboard figures. Christa is a stiff, bitchy wife, full of innuendos about her husband's spinelessness; Simon indeed seems incredibly wishy-washy, and poor Felix is a ridiculous good boy, polite to his parents, but equally eager to be Can's "friend" and convinced when Can with obvious mockery says they are "brothers." When Simon has reached his limit with Can, he manages to get him arrested for drug dealing, even though Felix was one of the customers he spied and in the police station Felix refuses to bear any witness to Can's criminal activity. Generations are in conflict, even though Felix and Simon don't fight. Can's father disowns him and Can weeps when he realizes this -- his sole moment of weakness.

'Rage' makes its points economically. The screenplay is swift-moving and pointed. The film tends to seem crude and exaggerated; there is no nuance in it. Conversely it is enormously effective in its clear aim of making viewers uncomfortable and illustrating the titular rage of young Turks.

Though there's no indication that Can's dignified, older father (Demir Gökgöl) is really poor, it's also clear that he's less well off than the Laubs. (Apparently the reason an associate professor has such an impressive spread is parental money.) Aladag has stated that for him Can is a hero, but this is a sad thing to know. Can is a prancing bully. Akin's anti-hero in 'Head-On,' Cahit, also wants to destroy himself as Can does, but the reasons are more complex, and in the hands of the immensely charismatic Birol Ünel, Cahit is funny and appealing. Two different approaches, both perhaps with their validity. If Aladag's 'Rage' arouses worthwhile debate of issues Germans have been unwilling to speak of, it will have had a positive value. But it feels like a film that would mostly just polarize or repel people.

Shown as part of the San Francisco International Film Festival 2007.

shocking taboo-breaker! Can, a young German pusher / drug dealer of Turkish immigrant's background, terrorizes the entire family of a university teacher until the very end, beginning with son Felix (a perfect victim). I see specially the professor's woman's part within the conflict as an extremely fatal and unhelpful one, since pseudo-powerful and pseudo-emancipated. Are our liberal (over-?) civilized democracies still able to stop such destructive aggressive human beings like Can? ...Or Achmadineschad? Why could this film not been shown in the early evening (8.15 pm) as announced first? It's subject will be specially important for younger people! However, a subject overdue to deal with!

I've seen this film a few days ago and i'm still a bit angry about the time i wasted on it. If i had known how bad i gets in the second half, i wouldn't had started watching it. Basically, i'm not against German movies, there are even many German ones amongst my favorites, but this film is crap. The first sequence starts with break dancing Turkish juveniles with migration background (according to the German official's language). In fact, i'm living all my live in an area with a quite high proportion of foreigners, especially Turkish people and i've never seen or heard of Turkish break-dancers or basket-ballplayers. Maybe there are some on German streets, but i think this was only put into this film to satisfy the stereotype image of the unexperienced viewers. I could accept the subplot dealing with problems in the relationship of the young boy's parents and in fact the acting of all actors is solid. But after all a pretentious viewer has to admit, big parts of the screenplay is rubbish. The whole story is based on the young boys improbable naivety. After he got beaten repeatedly, he accuses his father, why his generation has had let so many violent people into Germany, just to declare friendship a few days later with the same boy, who is responsible, that he got beaten up a few days before. Maybe, this review has made you curious for this movie and in fact i can't keep you away from this film, but i can recommend you an similar film, which is also set in a similar surrounding and really worth watching it: Knallhart by Detlev Buck.

This film is definitely one of my favorite films. Especially because love movies from the years between 2005-2006. The script of the film is very good, the fight between Simon and Can in the film is well written and you can quickly see what the film is about. I would have liked the film to be longer. I also like the places where the film was shot, but what I missed were the scenes in the classroom. Actors like "Simon laub" play their roles well as well as "Can" but "Felix" is not a good choice for the role in my opinion. All in all, it's a very good film, which I give it 10 points for. Nice film!