In
Jan Hrebejk’s film Divided We Fall, the director
concentrates on the daily experience and difficult dilemmas faced by residents
of a small Czech town during the Nazi occupation. The precise location is left blank so that a
general audience can relate to it. Just
as the main character, Josef Čižek, is an “everyman,” the city is an “everytown.” The village that he and his wife, Maria, live
in is purposefully portrayed as remote and “ordinary” to act as a microcosm for
the rest of Czechoslovakia.
The
film takes place solely in and around the town; instead of examining the war
from the perspective of soldiers, or the ethnic groups targeted by the Nazi
regime, it focuses on how it affected the daily lives of the residents. Whereas many films depict battlefields or
concentration camps during World War II, the intimate setting in Divided We Fall allows us to understand
the complexity of the Czech war experience through the subtleties of
relationships between family, friends, and acquaintances.
The small town setting also
demonstrates that no place was too small or out of the way for the Nazis to
occupy. The viewer can thus experience the effects of
Nazi occupation from the perspective of an ordinary civilian. The action of the film takes place primarily
on one street, which lends an air of insularity to the city; one knows one’s
neighbors intimately. The lack of any
range of setting typifies the insulating effect that the war had on many
people, especially in Eastern Europe where informants were common. The insular
effect of the war is also alluded to when Horst claims that Maria “voluntarily
lives in a tomb” and she responds, saying, “we all do.” Choosing a domestic location as the primary
setting for the film emphasizes the invasiveness of Nazi occupation in daily
life, and the danger of resisting. The
choice of this isolated apartment magnifies the fear, suspense, and emotional
tension.
The
film technically starts in 1937 when the Wiener family moves into their house,
but the main body of narration focuses on the two-year period from 1943 to 1945
when David Wiener hides in the Čižeks’ apartment, which was also the last two
years of Nazi occupation of Czechoslovakia.
The fact that we get a few glimpses of life before the war is
instrumental in conveying how much the lives of the townspeople change when the
war begins. Prior to the
war Josef worked for a company owned by the Wieners, a wealthy Jewish family. When the Nazis invade, the village splinters
from a bustling intermeshed community into groups of nationalist Czechs,
pro-Nazi Czechs, and Jews. In the face
of the Nazi might, no external resistance takes place, and the villagers simply
attempt to survive.
Josef and Maria Čižek come to hide David Wiener in
their home, in a way, by accident. Josef stumbles on David in the Wiener villa
when he goes to safeguard the family’s jewels from the Nazis who are coming
next morning. The Čížeks
come to hide David in their home largely as a result of circumstance and
loyalty, instead of outward heroism. Even though Josef prefers to maintain a
quiet, isolated, and somewhat lazy existence at home with his wife, his
memories of David’s decency before the war trigger a sense of
fidelity—reluctantly compelling him to protect his former employer after he
escapes from an extermination camp in Poland.
Josef comes to realize that David’s fate and that of the Čížek family are unavoidably entwined—if Josef
doesn’t protect David, the Nazis will most likely find him and execute the
Čížeks for refusing to turn in the fugitive.
The
“decision” to keep him thereafter was based mainly on preserving their own
safety and that of the whole neighborhood – David could potentially be traced
back to the Čižeks, and as Maria reminds Josef, “You decided for him, for you,
for me, and for everyone on this street.”
Josef’s only real moment of choice is when he decides not to rat out
David in the villa. After that, the other “decisions” are not really decisions
but consequences of that first choice. Tied into the contrast of helping each other and dividing against each
other are the themes of heroism and cowardice.
Both heroism and cowardice are rarely portrayed as proactive decisions,
but rather as reactions to moments.
The
notion of heroism during World War II is a tricky one for the Czechs and Divided We Fall reflects this. It portrays heroism in a very cynical light,
consistently undercutting what would normally be viewed as heroic acts. Dr. Albrecht Kepke’s younger son, who was
raised to be a Nazi soldier, turns out to be a coward, getting shot by his own
countrymen for desertion. The film
portrays the German notion of heroism as clear-cut. One is a hero or a coward; there are no
qualifications or asterisks attached to either category, such as the fact that
Dr. Kepke’s younger son was only a child, and it was wrong for his parents to
send him to war. Thus, this black and
white dichotomy is portrayed as dangerous in the film. Time and again, the film portrays “help” as the
simple act of staying faithful to those who helped you. In this sense, the film implicitly dismisses
Dr. Albrecht Kepke’s notion that true heroism, like that supposedly shown by
his older deceased sons, can only be found on the frontlines of battle.
Josef,
though heroic for saving David, is actually very fearful and apathetic –
qualities incongruous with the typical heroic personality. For example, Josef is ultimately a
hero because he spends two years risking his life as well as every life on his
street to house a Jewish fugitive. However, Josef is hostile toward David and
frequently exhibits behavior that could be labeled as “cowardly,” such as
soiling his pants upon finding David in the middle of the night. The
Čižeks could be considered heroes for taking David in, but one must also
remember that by being “heroic,” they are putting all of their neighbors in danger.
Similarly,
even Horst Prochazka, whom the filmmakers illustrate as a cowardly, adulterous
collaborator insists to Josef that “we must help each other”—and diverts Nazi
investigators despite his knowledge that the Čížeks are hiding a Jew in their
home. While visiting the Čižeks, Horst says, “Who would be
foolish enough today to act like a hero... We have to survive. Every lovely thing should survive, be saved,
eh?” Then, as the war was coming to a
close, Horst began expressing his fears about being skinned by the Czechs; immediately
after, Horst helped the Čižeks deflect the German police to save them and the
Jew that they were hiding. Josef offering Horst a cigarette both times linked
the two scenes- the first time Horst snuffed him, yet the second time he
accepted the offer and said “divided we fall.”
Lastly,
Franta, viewed as a hero for leading the local resistance against the Nazis,
was also the first to attempt to report David’s return out of fear that he
would be killed. Every character in the
film exists somewhere on a spectrum between heroism and cowardice, an ambiguity
reminiscent of the passive resistance of the “good soldier Švejk” in Czech
literature.
The film emphasizes that the concepts of help and
heroism don’t stem from bold, visible acts of defiance, but rather from
remaining true to one’s morals and relationships when the direst of situations
arise. In contrast to most war movies, Divided We Fall largely portrays heroism
as the simple act of being loyal and staying true to friends, even in times of
crisis and imminent danger. Individuals like Josef and Horst
are weak and helpless when facing a faceless, shapeless terror that is everywhere. The
film rationalizes the nation’s collaboration with the occupiers and its somewhat cowardly endurance:
because survival is in itself heroic, collaboration can be forgiven.
Instead
of focusing on the physical heroism of combat, as is so often portrayed in
films addressing World War II, Divided We
Fall sends the message that ordinary people must work together and assist
each other. This film conveys a sense of
a national Czech community. And it is
this community that will fall if divided.
The Čižeks, along with everyone else, seem to be
deteriorating as the film progresses, as the isolation becomes debilitating. Horst says, “We must help each other”
to Josef several times: first to persuade him to work for the Germans and later
to explain why he protects the Čižek family.
By saying “we need to help each other,” Horst is stressing his own Czech
identity and at the same time subconsciously rejecting his connection with the
Germans. Rather than imply collaboration
with the Germans, this sentence suggests collaboration with fellow Czechs. The ending of the film portrays
this theme powerfully, as only through helping each other are Josef, Maria,
David, and Horst all saved from almost certain death and the rebuilding process
can begin.
The actor Bolek Polívka,
who plays Josef Čižek,
communicates mainly with his eyes, usually by widening them or occasionally
glaring to show Josef’s emotions. His
eyes usually show his fear, disgust, or whatever emotion he is
experiencing. Josef
does not change his character based on whether he is playing the “rescuer” or
the “collaborator”. Horst tried to teach him a blank
loyal stare, and Josef could only contort his face into something that looked
vacant and dumb. He looks phony when he
practices his face with Horst; when Maria tells Horst and Dr. Kepke about being
pregnant—an instance when Josef should have used his practiced face—Josef’s
face gives away his immense surprise.
Josef’s gestures and expressions are
comical at times, but hint at deeper emotions.
Josef’s body language expresses his fear and courage,
despair and joy, indifference and compassion.
After first taking in David, Josef reacts sometime later by
soiling himself from the realization that he is hiding a Jew. Shortly after Josef learns about his
infertility, he tries to socialize with a schoolteacher and her students, but
comes across as resolutely creepy. Josef is always touching his wife in some way,
a symbol of trust and loyalty. On the
other side, he is able to successfully convey skepticism or disdain through
even slight changes in his facial expression. Polívka smooches his fugitive, David, out of
frustration after yelling at him for attempting to leave; similarly, in a later
scene, Polívka kisses David again to express relief at his timely reappearance
when the Captain threatened to shoot his Josef for “collaborating” with the
Nazis. These very human gestures allow
us to clearly see how Josef struggles with both the roles of “rescuer” and
“collaborator.”
Polívka
depicts the character of Josef Čižek as a reluctant rescuer. The fear and desperation whenever Josef
played the role of rescuer are immediately clear from Polívka’s acting. He is unnatural in many of his responses,
such as his awkward belting of “Mein Gorilla” when he needs to distract Horst
from David and Maria under the bed covers.
Despite his clumsiness, however, Josef is effective and is the film’s
rescuer. Josef combines in himself the apathetic civilian, wanting only to return
to a normalcy and the heroic rescuer, risking everything to save a friend’s
life.
This
film blurs the lines between collaborating with the enemy and staying loyal to
one’s home, which can both be considered “help.” This film depicts no
straightforward collaboration or loyalty. Collaboration
is “helping” the enemy. For this reason,
anyone and everyone could be a collaborator.
However, the interconnectedness of events, such as the ones that led to
Josef working for Dr. Kepke, illustrates that collaboration is more complex
that aiding and abetting the enemy.
Josef reminds us that all the collaboration occurring is part of a
complicated situation: “You wouldn’t believe what abnormal times can do to
normal people.” Forgiveness must be
offered to one’s countrymen, because no one emerged scot-free. Collaborating with the enemy is not the same
as being the enemy, especially when
there is an inequity of physical power.
Edited by Ben Collins-Wood and Katie Contess
