PAPERWORK

SOPHIE SCHOLL: THE FINAL DAYS (2005) by Marc Rothemund patiently, achingly, walks us step-by-step through the banality of bureaucratic evil as brother, sister, and friend pay the ultimate price for defying political powers-that-be.

Many contemporary German films are concerned with post-Nazi national redemption—the hope for catharsis in stories of Hitler’s atrocities. In SOPHIE SCHOLL we find redemption in both the Christian faith of its protagonist (presented as a modern day Joan of Arc) and a damning repudiation of the ruling class with its grandstanding leaders and just-doing-my-job bureaucrats.

The border lines drawn in SOPHIE SCHOLL are PowerPoint flow charts, chains of command, legal briefs and procedures imposed by administrators. “Evil….(as) commonplace and as routine as paperwork.” (Wendy McElroy)

Good men may rail against abstract ideas, but they are no match for the objectivity of law. A very German theme, indeed.