Recapturing the Body
Two Films about History and Authenticity
Deutsche Fassung
Abstract
Lee Miller’s famous portrait in Hitler’s bathtub, taken in May 1945, opens a long series of cinematic and photographic responses to the war of annihilation and the Holocaust, at the centre of which is the body. More recent contributions to this discussion are László Nemes Jeles’s Oscar-winning feature film “Saul’s Son” (2015) and the Polish work of docufiction “The Warsaw Uprising” (2014). “Saul’s Son” tells the story of recapturing a body and has as its goal a symbolic recapturing of history. “The Warsaw Uprising” (2014), which is based on retroactively colourised original footage from 1944 to which music has been added, also seeks to revive history.
(Osteuropa 6-7/2016, pp. 33–41)