Nelly was hardly disfigured at all. No surgeon (especially then) could have done such a good repair job.
And even if she looked totally different, there would be many other clues to a person's identity, such as voice, accent, hands, mannerisms, gait, personality.....endless. A great film but unrealistic on this level.
There are two things here.
Firstly, a persons belief system can be hugely overpowering to things like evidence to the contrary, details etc. Once he believes his wife is dead, his mind isn't open to the idea that the girl could be her - even when she matches her signature. This is a common thing - people get stuck in belief systems all the time despite massive evidence to the contrary. Similarly, she wanted to believe that he loved her, and so was distorting all of his actions towards a love for his dead wife rather than greed.
The second thing is that to allow this dynamic to play out with all its intrigue and ideas, you have to accept some artistic licence. Its a similar situation with films like Vertigo, Timecrimes, Predestination, or even Face/Off.
Yes, your psychological points are good ones rabbitmoon, but I think this is asking the viewer to suspend just too much disbelief, or reality - And this applies for the second point also, about artistic licence.
Anyway, good film otherwise, with a great last scene.
I think the international logline is something like: "A disfigured concentration camp, unrecognizable after surgery..". I don't think it's a fitting one. The disfiguration part is about having been shot in the face in the camp. But we don't know if she's really unrecognizable or not. The movie's main theme is suggestion. Johnny doesn't want to see Nelly in the mysterious "Esther" because he's desperately escaping his sense of guilt and blocking his mind to her image. His speech about why he feels his plan might succeed perfectly summarizes what the movie is about: he explains people wouldn't care about the contrivances of a camp survivor return in a beautiful red dress and Parisian shoes, because all they want is to be reunited their Nelly, standing tall and everything. So, the fact some characters recognize her while others don't has a lot to do with what they respectively want/don't want to see.
I think the hypnotic/magical atmosphere of the film works so perfectly because, except for an old photo where her face is partially covered by hair, we never see how Nelly looked before surgery. So, we don't know how much her recognizability factor is due to an effective change or a state of mind. Talking about the beautiful scene where Nelly visits the ruins of her house and sees the similar ruins of her visage reflected in the puddle, Nina herself said: "I don't recognize myself either". Because she's so wounded inside that the outside feels different too. When she asks Lene if she would recognize her, she replies with an hesitant and ambiguous ".. yes". That little margin of doubt makes the whole experience all the more intriguing to me.
To add to your excellent points, I would say that it plays into the collective amnesia of the German people after the war. The feeling of wanting to move on and forget, to not acknowledge their part in the war. The theme has been covered in other books and films, and here it goes along with Johnny's guilt making him not realize that his wife is alive and well.
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To add to your excellent points, I would say that it plays into the collective amnesia of the German people after the war. The feeling of wanting to move on and forget, to not acknowledge their part in the war. The theme has been covered in other books and films, and here it goes along with Johnny's guilt making him not realize that his wife is alive and well.
...it plays into the collective amnesia of the German people after the war. The feeling of wanting to move on and forget, to not acknowledge their part in the war...it goes along with Johnny's guilt...
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the fact some characters recognize her while others don't has a lot to do with what they respectively want/don't want to see.
One indispensable thing I picked up from Robert Anton Wilson. "Belief system" should be properly abbreviated B.S. Please see the film "Maybe Logic" if you have no idea who R.A.W. is...
shareThe character is supposed to have had reconstructive surgery on her face. We don't have a really clear look of her in any old pictures, you don't know what she looked like before
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I think part of why Johnny didn't recognize her was that it was easier to tell himself she was dead so he could inherit her money, as a coping mechanism or denial. It was easier for him to reconstruct her into his own ideal than to see her right in front of him.
There's something I know when I'm with you that I forget when I'm away
Ged59: The great novelist Henry James said that "you have to grant the artist his donnee (French word for "given")." In other words, only begin your evaluation after you have accepted the basic premise. We don't mind doing that with fantasy and science-fiction, but we should also allow it with other kinds of works. The idea is sort of akin to Hitchcock's "MacGuffin," the thing that you accept to get the film's story going.
shareReasonable point pjpoconnell.......but I must be too literal, or male,or Aspergers or something, cos I can't really get past it being impossibly unrealistic.
shareI had no problem with any of that, based on the fact that she had been physically ruined in the concentration camp. Not just cosmetically, but her constitution and physical and mental health, as well. This was evidenced by the way she carried herself--eyes darting about as if in constant fear, hesitant and awkward steps, arms kept close to the body or one hand usually holding the opposite arm--all signs of extreme post-traumatic stress and serious anxiety. Mannerisms, gait, and the like were wiped away. We didn't even have to see what those traits had been for us to pick up on the fragile and unsure way she moved now.
Consider that she had been a pre-war performer and apparently quite popular; her post-war mannerisms and behavior were terribly inconsistent with this, telling us that she had been all but destroyed by her experience in the camps. I felt that this whole aspect of Nina Hoss's portrayal of Nelly was one of the better examples of acting I've seen in recent years.
Now couple this with Johnny's greed for Nelly's inheritance and guilt over what he had done to the woman he certainly loved and I think it's easier to accept that he would not see the truth. That is, until Nelly's entire demeanor changed as she did what she once did best--perform. Nina Hoss's other acting triumph in this film: taking a broken woman from the depths of despair to the self-assured and exuberant confidence of a once-great singer in the space of a song.
That few minutes made more of an impression on me than the entirety of half the films I've seen this year, certainly moreso than the dreck being churned out by Hollywood. Thanks for listening, you've been a great audience.
"Battle not with monsters lest ye become a monster"
Nelly was hardly disfigured at all. No surgeon (especially then) could have done such a good repair job.It's a movie.
Yeah, and her family recognized her instantly. I think the reason Johnny didn't was some type of denial, he had worked to put her out of his mind.
shareThis was also my problem with this movie. Like Mrs. Doubtfire, suspension of disbelief only carries you so far. You will always recognize your wife, regardless of how much facial changes have occurred.
shareWatch the documentary The Imposter where an abducted child returns to his family with a different eye color, and they all 100% believe it's him. We see what we want to see and believe what we want to believe. We see with our minds, not our eyes. Not unrealistic at all, the denial factor was very strong - in all of Germany! No one knew what was going on - so where in fact were their Jewish neighbors? Johnny is in huge denial. She is, too. When she imitates her own handwriting perfectly and hands it to him, she says, "you understand?" It's a subconscious game of her not believing he betrayed and him not being able to accept that it's her.
Also we don't get to see her before photograph. She herself claims to have a new face.