Class Relations (1984)

From https://pics.filmaffinity.com
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Directors: Jean-Marie Straub and Danielle Huillet

Based on the novel Amerika by Franz Kafka

Cast: Christian Heinisch as Karl Roßmann; Nazzareno Bianconi as Giacomo; Mario Adorf as Onkel; Laura Betti as Brunelda; Harun Farocki as Delamarche; Manfred Blank as Robinson; Reinald Schnell  as Heizer; Anna Schnell as Line; Klaus Traube as Kapitän; Georg Brintrup as Student; Hermann Hartmann as Oberkassierer; Gérard Semaan as Schubal; Jean-François Quinque as Stewart; Villi Vöbel as Pollunder

Straub-Huillet adapting Franz Kafka? Yes, that did happen and this is the most accessible of their films as a linear narrative, whilst not losing an ounce of their difficult idiosyncratic style. Class Relations is based on Kafka's unfinished novel Amerika, where he notably never travelled to America but created a version based upon research and his fears, is still an unconventional production in that it is a minimalistic, slow paced work in which a German immigrant to the United States finds himself falling through an exploitative world that makes no sense, all depicted by the directors' stark static shots and precise formal style with an eye laser focused against this kind of capitalist environment.

Or at least the type of structure this calmly hellish, in which the protagonist is a prop from the get-go, when he drops his suitcase on the ship he is on to find his lost umbrella, only to get lost and find himself in an argument with the administration on the ship over the treatment over a minor staff member. In the midst of class bias, complete lies and people desiring to even force him into servant hood, all of it fits into Kafka's take on an illogical world but also suits Straub's Marxist viewpoint, the title change adamant to the issues tackled here. Thankfully, the acting is not the deliberately flat performances of a few early seventies experiments of theirs, but with a cast that occasionally break out into gravitas, usually from the middle management who are selfish and deceitful, whilst a lot of the performances are a minimalistic acting style common from the auteurs that does succeed completely.

Whilst Class Relations is a slow film in pacing, this has to be one of the most dynamic of Straub-Huillet's fictional films as they structure the film over dramatic vignettes where their lead wanders through like a deer in the headlights. No one barring a few people are truly kind, fellow wanderers raiding his suitcase or trying to force him into servitude, and even those who are kind to him can lose their respect for him if lies are said of him being a lewd, unprofessional employee without proof.

From https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-zWJ1k1MR5kA/XWoRMAofZhI/AAAAAAAAF-M/PXv4-fhGV0AMKZGs58fVG_CwUnrt647FACLcBGAs/s1600/1984%2BKlassenverhaltnisse%2Bsuitcase.JPG

"Kafkaesque" is the notion of an oppressive/nightmarish world of rules and orders which do not make sense. The Castle famously is about a man who cannot get to his goal due to rules and contradictions, which stalls his ability to even to get to the titular castle and befittingly, as another unfinished novel of Kafka's, ends halfway through a sentence. Class Relations imagines this as calmly as you can get, when Orson Welles had to create a highly stylised world for his 1962 adaptation of The Trial, but the notion of Kafkaesque is found here in a different way. Simply as one obstruction along the way is just being forced out on a balcony of an apartment as the mistress of the apartment changes, which means the protagonist is not allowed to re-enter unless told he can. The fact [a Major but subjective spoiler] the film ends with him on a trail on his way to a job suggests a happy ending, but the tone does suggest how it could easily fall into more illogical rules as he claws for even some wages to live off.

It makes Class Relations a faithful work but also succeeds for the directors as everything they depict, no matter how strange, could easily happen in real life in how they show it in a banal, matter-of-fact way. Straub and Huillet adapted Amerika with very clear reasoning and succeeded. In terms of the production, this marks a return to the monochrome films of their career of the sixties, when they had worked in colour for their documentaries and fiction films through the seventies. Possibly the choice was a) for period tone, or maybe even b) as a film shot mostly in Germany (with inserts of American locations) with the cast mainly speaking German to create their own version of America in lieu to possible practical restrictions; it nonetheless suits the tone entirely. Their style for non-documentary films was fully cemented by this time - fixed camera shots and a moderate pace, some Straub-Huillet trademarks found such as the contemplation of the environment or the abrupt introduction of actors, via editing, such as a policeman who adds further hassle for the lead character.

Is it abstract? Not particularly, but in terms of cinema, Straub--Huillet are unique, not a duo to merely say filmed cinema the same way as other art house filmmakers despite many following their example, and to adapt Kafka even this "realistically" doesn't negate the curious nature of an adaptation of a novel by a man who never set foot in the US, and constructed it partially from his own neurosis. Befittingly its own patchwork of European cinema with these themes, Kafka in general meeting these distinct and political filmmakers understandably creates something idiosyncratic. Its definitely a gem from them that could be a good gateway feature too for audiences hesitant to try their cinema.

Abstract Spectrum: Minimalist

Abstract Rating (High/Medium/Low/None): None

From http://deeperintomovies.net/journal/image11/classrelations1.jpg