The knife in the back
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| Original title | The knife in the back |
| Country of production | Germany |
| original language | German |
| Publishing year | 1975 |
| length | 97 minutes |
| Age rating | FSK 16 |
| Rod | |
| Director | Ottokar Runze |
| script | Ottokar Runze |
| production | Ottokar Runze |
| music | Hans-Martin Majewski |
| camera | Michael Epp |
| cut | Tamara Epp |
| occupation | |
| |
The knife in the back is a German fiction film from 1975 by Ottokar Runze with Hans Brenner in the leading role.
action
The eponymous knife in the back hit a boy who tried to throw a knife with his buddies in the forest. The boy gets away with his life and explains that it was not the knife thrower who was to blame for the accident, but rather himself. This little episode serves as an introduction to the actual story, the focus of which is a bloody deed in Hamburg's red light district St. Pauli had played. Six witnesses claim to have seen a pimp stab a Greek guest worker. The alleged perpetrator fled, but turned himself in to the police a little later. During the interrogation, Hans Eder, a Hamburg-based native of Vienna, claims that the incident was a tragic accident. According to Eder, he happened to be carrying the knife with him and the Greek attacked him. So Eder only defended himself and never wanted to kill the man.
Six witnesses are questioned during the subsequent examination by the examining magistrate. Neither of them can confirm the pimp's version, but on the other hand the testimonies contradict each other. Everyone has a different sequence of events in memory, and the viewer can now compare the truthfulness of these statements, since the actual process is shown repeatedly. It's about guilt and it's about objective truth. The juxtaposition of the various statements, the influence of the various interests of all those involved on the statements soon make it clear that there is no objective truth, especially since the most important witness, the dead Greek, can no longer be questioned. The lay judges in the upcoming jury trial also include two parents of the two children involved in the knife throwing accident: the father of the thrower and the mother of the injured person. A teacher of the two boys is also there, as well as a doctor and a nurse and another person who is not involved in the processes in the forest and their consequences.
In view of this constellation of lay judges, the film shows that real neutrality and objective are not necessarily indicated, especially since mother, father, doctor and nurse were involved in the case of the knife-throwing child. Biases and biases, so the message goes, can cause even the best of intentions to lose their neutrality. Your own guilt, for example that of a parent who has been inattentive or a person providing medical assistance, must also not be disregarded when assessing the other person's case to be negotiated. So what is it in the case of the dead Greek: deliberate act, as the prosecutor implies, or a tragic accident, as the accused claims? The lay judges must pass judgment, and in this case the guilty verdict follows. Hans Eder is transported back to his prison cell, but the schoolchildren have pulled themselves together again and played peacefully together.
Production notes
The knife in the back was made between March 1st and 24th, 1975 in Hamburg. After the FSK examination on June 19, 1975, the film was released in German cinemas on July 11, 1975.
The equipment and costumes are from Peter Scharff .
Reviews
"After the rogue comedy" Der Lord von Barmbeck "and the prisoner-playing-judge documentation" In the Name of the People ", Ottokar Runze continues to track down the judiciary. His new feature film, "The Knife in the Back", is intended to "awaken understanding for judges and lay judges". After an original case - stabbing in the Loddel milieu on the Reeperbahn - Runze constructed a kind of "twelve jurors" at the "crime scene": With meticulousness and prejudice, an extremely heterogeneous group of lay judges and an exemplary human judge examine whether the Viennese pimp Erich (Hans Brenner) has committed manslaughter or only acted in self-defense. According to Runze, you come to a "far milder verdict than in the original case". "
“A Viennese merchant ran into a foreigner in Hamburg's Reeperbahn district. The police investigations paint a different picture than the statements made by the perpetrator; In addition, the establishment of the truth is complicated by the different ideological attitudes of the judges and jury. Author and director Runze again reflects on problems of German jurisprudence, whereby he shows himself to be more accomplished in the discussion of theses than in the staging of the plot. "
“The following productions varied Runze's interest in the subjects of justice, crime and the people involved. His recurring motif was the confrontation with guilt and atonement, with the culpable entanglement of the individual in the context of his environment, society. Runze tried to uncover social backgrounds that provided information on the behavioral patterns of his protagonists. Again and again, the psychologization of the culpably entangled main characters was the focus of Runze's interest - so the director, whose in-depth productions moved further and further away from simple, entertaining mainstream entertainment patterns in the course of the 1970s, gradually developed into the German André Cayatte . "
Web links
- The knife in the back in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- The knife in the back at filmportal.de