The Wave

In media last week we watched a film called 'The Wave' (Die Welle) from the director Dennis Gansel. It's a German film, so this meant we watched the entire film with subtitles. This was a challenge at first, but once I got into the routine of it, I began to connect with the film more. The basic plot of the film is about a teacher (Jurgen Vogel) who uses his power to influence his students into a cult gang; 'The Wave'. He transforms them into united group, dressed in white shirts. This is made as a key feature of the film, the white shirts become compulsary to their collective status within the school.Within the film there are many different scenarios in which we see the powerful force they have over the other pupils. Their military like nature is demonstrated through their salute and the way they have to recieve permission to talk & stand up whilst doing so. The 'cult gang' also come up with a trademark for their group, and in one of the more visually stimulating scenes you see them running around their town 'tagging' everything with their symbol. This is also one of the first times you see the extremities of which one of the pupils will go to. Firstly, when meeting an opposing group of older men, he pulls out a gun (which later becomes iconic) and then later climbs the Town hall, covered in scaffolding showing the risks he is willing to take for his so called 'people'.

The idea of this film is based on a real story in America, in which a teacher followed the same pronciples i've spoke of previously creating a clut gang. Originally, it started as just a simple lesson which then turned into a week experiment. However, the ending was completely different as it did not end in suicide. The students were informed that it was part of an experiment and went back to ordinary school next week.

We felt the impact this film had on our project is that it illustrated a strong sense of collective identity. This related to our idea due to the fact that vagrants are put under the title of 'homelessness' and are not seen as individuals.

Over & Out, Caity x