뉴밀레니엄 전환기의 독일영화 - 베를린파 영화를 중심으로 -

Abstract

German Cinema as a national cinema was well known with German Expressionism in 1920s or New German Cinema in 1970s that had impressed the public in the international film history. But after Werner Fassbinder's death in 1982, it didn't gain any international recognition and met with less favor from international critics. But new tendencies of the German Cinema emerged around beginning new millenium and those has made a kind of renaissance during the last two decades. At that time, many German films impressed the film critics and caught attention of the public in many international film festivals. For example, there were not only award-winning German Films like “Nowhere in Africa”(2001) by Caroline Link, “The Lives of Others”(2006) by Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck, both won “the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film”, or Fathie Akin’s “Head on”(2004) that won the golden Bear in the Berlinale, but also several successful films at the box office as well as in the review like “Lola run”(1998) by Tom Tykwer, “The Downfall”(2004) by Oliver Hirschbiegel or “Good bye, Lenin!”(2003) by Wolfgang Becker. Besides, several young filmmakers called later Berlin School, like Christian Petzold, Angela Schanelec and Thomas Arslan, distinguished themselves from the mainstream in the 1990s. They have made theirs films with the much more personal film style and recognized film as art. This paper is to explore the German film history in the era of new millennium, focusing on the movement of Berlin School. Berlin School is one of the most important film tendencies of the German Cinema that have appeared around new millennium, especially in the early 21st century. Berlin School, called also “Counter Cinema” because of their filmic attitudes against the mainstream, has drawn the international film critics’ attention onto the German Cinema again after New German Cinema. This new filmic movement has first started with the films by Christian Petzold, Angela Schanelec and Thomas Arslan, who all studied together at the German Film and Television Academy in Berlin(dffb) around the last 1980s and early 1990s and made their debut films in the 1990s. The films of Berlin School seem to have the simple stories and the similar film style that is characterized by minimalism. Besides these three directors from dffb, several directors, such like Christoph Hochhäusler, Benjamin Heisenberg, Maren Ade, Ulrich Köhler, Valeska Grisebach, produced their films with the minimalism style telling the simple stories from every common life. These filmmakers have recognized film as art and sought out the meaning of film, not aimed at the commercial success. By showing the personal film style as well as similar comprehension of the film, they have drawn the attention of the worldwide film critics. Especially many french critics paid tribute to the films of Berlin School as calling these films as ‘Nouvelle Vague Allemande’. The purpose of this paper is to explain Berlin School which is significant in the German Cinema as national cinema, and to understand it in the context of the german film history. I would like to focus on explaining some characteristic features and the innovative style as well as the present and the possibility of Berlin School in this paper.