'A Woman in Berlin' is set in the last days of World War II as the Soviet Army wreaks vengeance upon the German civilian population following their invasion of the German capital. The main recipient of the soldiers' wrath are the women of Berlin who they end up raping in great numbers. The focus of the movie is one woman, Anonyma, who attempts to survive in the midst of great degradation and humiliation. 'A Woman in Berlin' is based on the a true-life anonymous diary which was published in West Germany in 1959. At that time, the diary created a scandal, where the German public could not accept the graphic descriptions of women as rape victims. The author withdrew her work from publication for approximately four decades until it was republished and accepted by a new generation of Germans.
At the beginning of the film, in a flashback, we see Anonyma in her earlier life as a journalist and unrepentant supporter of the Nazi cause. After the Soviet invasion, Anonyma takes refuge in an apartment building where she's given shelter by an older woman. In one harrowing scene after another, the brutish Russian soldiers raid the apartment building and seek out their female victims. Some women are dragged off the street and raped in dark hallways or alleyways. Unlike the other residents of her building, Anonyma speaks Russian and at first attempts to appeal to someone in charge to stop the brutality. When she approaches one officer and asks to speak to someone in charge, he asks, who do you want to speak to—we're all commanders here. When she finally gets to speak to an officer, he asks her why she's so upset, indifferently and nonchalantly pointing out that the rapes only take a few minutes.
After Anonyma is raped herself, she's determined not to be violated again. She first seeks out a lower ranking soldier, Anatol, as a protector but then moves on to Major Andrei Rybkin who is educated like her and they end up forming a bond together. Meanwhile, as the Russian Army gains more control, the residents of the apartment building begin forming more of a relationship with their occupiers. The Russians come off as more complex as they first appear especially in regards to their interactions with the apartment residents.
The détente between the two groups is shattered when a Russian soldier discovers that a young woman, a Nazi sympathizer, has been shielding a young German Solder who is in possession of a gun and a hand grenade. The Russian solder throws the German over the stairway landing and he plunges to his death, stories below. When Anonyma admits that she was aware that the couple had been hiding in the attic, the Major refuses to bring her up on charges. The Major is castigated by his men and eventually he is removed from his command and either sent to Siberia or executed (it's not clear what is his exact fate).
The film ends when Anonyma's soldier-boyfriend returns from the front and she gives him her diary to read (she has been addressing it to him, all along). The boyfriend wants nothing to do with Anonyma as he ashamed that she was raped. The implication is that she allowed herself to be subjected to the humiliation and is now forever, a 'marked woman'. The boyfriend takes off, leaving Anonyma to fend for herself. I question how the boyfriend could have ended up back home without being taken into custody by the Russians, who were rounding up all ex-soldiers and shipping them off to imprisonment in the Soviet Union.
'A Woman in Berlin' commendably handles the rape scenes in a matter-of-fact way. There is nothing salacious about these depictions as the focus is more on how the women maintain their dignity in the face of all the depravity. Oftentimes, the women use humor to brunt the feelings of pain and humiliation—other times they express detached objectivity (one woman greets a friend on the street and asks, "how many?")
The film does suggest a number of times that there is a reason for the Russian soldiers' brutish behavior. A German woman tells another that had the Russians did what (our) soldiers did to them, "we would all be dead by now". In another good scene, Anonyma is called upon to translate a Russian soldier's account of the massacre of his family by Germans. And finally, it's revealed that Andrei's own wife was killed by German soldiers. Still, some kind of prologue at the beginning of the film, chronicling the extent the German atrocities committed against the Russian population, would have put things more in its proper context. While the rape of German women by the Russian soldiers was deplorable, the film could have made the soldiers' motivations for doing so, more understandable.
'A Woman in Berlin' is a bit long and sometimes it's difficult to follow everything that's happening. All in all, this is an admirable film, depicting a little talked about period in history with verisimilitude and insight.
At the beginning of the film, in a flashback, we see Anonyma in her earlier life as a journalist and unrepentant supporter of the Nazi cause. After the Soviet invasion, Anonyma takes refuge in an apartment building where she's given shelter by an older woman. In one harrowing scene after another, the brutish Russian soldiers raid the apartment building and seek out their female victims. Some women are dragged off the street and raped in dark hallways or alleyways. Unlike the other residents of her building, Anonyma speaks Russian and at first attempts to appeal to someone in charge to stop the brutality. When she approaches one officer and asks to speak to someone in charge, he asks, who do you want to speak to—we're all commanders here. When she finally gets to speak to an officer, he asks her why she's so upset, indifferently and nonchalantly pointing out that the rapes only take a few minutes.
After Anonyma is raped herself, she's determined not to be violated again. She first seeks out a lower ranking soldier, Anatol, as a protector but then moves on to Major Andrei Rybkin who is educated like her and they end up forming a bond together. Meanwhile, as the Russian Army gains more control, the residents of the apartment building begin forming more of a relationship with their occupiers. The Russians come off as more complex as they first appear especially in regards to their interactions with the apartment residents.
The détente between the two groups is shattered when a Russian soldier discovers that a young woman, a Nazi sympathizer, has been shielding a young German Solder who is in possession of a gun and a hand grenade. The Russian solder throws the German over the stairway landing and he plunges to his death, stories below. When Anonyma admits that she was aware that the couple had been hiding in the attic, the Major refuses to bring her up on charges. The Major is castigated by his men and eventually he is removed from his command and either sent to Siberia or executed (it's not clear what is his exact fate).
The film ends when Anonyma's soldier-boyfriend returns from the front and she gives him her diary to read (she has been addressing it to him, all along). The boyfriend wants nothing to do with Anonyma as he ashamed that she was raped. The implication is that she allowed herself to be subjected to the humiliation and is now forever, a 'marked woman'. The boyfriend takes off, leaving Anonyma to fend for herself. I question how the boyfriend could have ended up back home without being taken into custody by the Russians, who were rounding up all ex-soldiers and shipping them off to imprisonment in the Soviet Union.
'A Woman in Berlin' commendably handles the rape scenes in a matter-of-fact way. There is nothing salacious about these depictions as the focus is more on how the women maintain their dignity in the face of all the depravity. Oftentimes, the women use humor to brunt the feelings of pain and humiliation—other times they express detached objectivity (one woman greets a friend on the street and asks, "how many?")
The film does suggest a number of times that there is a reason for the Russian soldiers' brutish behavior. A German woman tells another that had the Russians did what (our) soldiers did to them, "we would all be dead by now". In another good scene, Anonyma is called upon to translate a Russian soldier's account of the massacre of his family by Germans. And finally, it's revealed that Andrei's own wife was killed by German soldiers. Still, some kind of prologue at the beginning of the film, chronicling the extent the German atrocities committed against the Russian population, would have put things more in its proper context. While the rape of German women by the Russian soldiers was deplorable, the film could have made the soldiers' motivations for doing so, more understandable.
'A Woman in Berlin' is a bit long and sometimes it's difficult to follow everything that's happening. All in all, this is an admirable film, depicting a little talked about period in history with verisimilitude and insight.