Berlin Alexanderplatz

By: Amos Lassen

"BERLIN ALEXANDERPLATZ"
Francis and the Berlin Underground
Amos Lassen
Director Burhan Qurbani's "Berlin Alexanderplatz" is a contemporary adaptation of Alfred Döblin's novel. We enter Berlin's underworld through the vehicle of Francis (Welket Bungué).
Francis is an immigrant from Guinea-Bissau who must quickly adapt to survive. We are given hints about his life in Guinea-Bissau and his arrival in Germany gives him an chance to start afresh. He goes from backbreaking physical labor to meeting a dealer named Reinhold (Albrecht Schuch). Francis becomes his right-hand man. Reinhold instructs Francis in the mechanics of crime and uses Francis to prevent Reinhold from taking his psychopathology of hurting women to its ultimate end. Francis and Reinhold jump from woman to woman, inflicting on them all sorts of violence and degradation, until Francis meets Mieze (Jella Haase). When Reinhold discovers Francis's love for Mieze, a twisted triangle of jealousy and violence is formed.
The grittiness of the film is presented in stylized neons and pastels as it jumps from stereotype to stereotype. Every sex worker in the film is made into a ready-made recipient of sadistic violence. Business meetings are conducted in either strip clubs or dance clubs where we see debauchery through music and mesmerized dancers. Mob bosses display their power by inflicting pain on subordinates.
Francis is a blank slate. He conveys little emotion even when trying to show emotion. In one scene, Francis's war between sin and decency is portrayed using simple metaphors. There are important threads running through the film ? the invisibility of the immigrant, the danger of assimilation. Francis attempts to assimilate by way of the few avenues available to. In saying declares, "I am the German Dream:, Francis lists all the makers that signal his identification as a German ? he drives a German car, has a German girlfriend, makes his own money within the German economy but then the film cuts to more scenes of violence against women.
When Francis only speaks a little German, a female voice-over supplements him and guides us through his initial life in Germany. Though the more Francis speaks, the more the voice turns silent and lets him take center stage. He will find his way to Berlin, where he will fall and stand up three times in an attempt to be a 'good person' and then Berlin will deal him the final blow and he will be turned into pieces one and for all.
"Berlin Alexanderplatz" highlights the poverty of opportunities available in people of Francis' situation and how criminal paths that are being offered to them can have terrible moral consequences.