DOI: 10.62425/korpus.1930802 ISSN: 2822-6313

Post-Heroic War in German Film: Im Westen nichts Neues (2022) and Die Brücke (1959)

Mark Gagnon
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This article explores the anti-redemptive structure of German war cinema through a comparative analysis of Im Westen nichts Neues (2022) and Die Brücke (1959). It argues that both films articulate a post-heroic mode of representation in which war is deprived of meaning, resolution, and transcendence. Rather than presenting soldiers as heroes, both films depict them as victims of generational betrayal and collapsing systems of authority. Berger’s adaptation constructs war as an immersive experience of bodily and psychological disintegration, reinforced through graphic imagery, dissonant sound, and the concentration of responsibility in a distant command figure. Wicki’s film, by contrast, disperses responsibility across absent and compromised adults, while narratively emptying the combat objective of strategic value. Despite these differences, both films deny the possibility of narrative closure: their conflicts end not in victory or sacrifice, but in senseless loss. By situating these works within a longer tradition of German war representation, the article argues that the refusal of redemption is a defining feature of German cinematic engagement with war. This tradition reflects an ongoing negotiation of historical responsibility and raises broader questions about the limits of representing military violence as meaningful in contemporary German culture.

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