In the devastated Berlin of May 1945, a young woman tries to save her life by forming "friendships" with Russian soldiers. Under the pseudonym Anonyma, the woman wrote down her horror story in her diary.
For a long time it has been an overlooked, even almost forbidden, subject:German women offering their bodies to the enemy during the Second World War. In 1959, a German woman under the pseudonym Anonyma published her horror story in a diary. A story about mass rapes of Berlin women by Russian soldiers around the liberation of Berlin.
A story about women who voluntarily entered into relationships with Russian soldiers, just to avoid worse. Sex as a remedy for one's own body. Many a woman chose to share the bed with the victor above to hide between the sheets again with the returned, often traumatized loser. Those who did take the hubby back often lived in a marriage of convenience. Husband and wife did not ask each other how they each survived the war.
This contradictory theme . This was also apparent from the criticism that the anonymous writer received after the publication of her diary. For what is more painful for a nation than to be confronted with its own shortcomings. Feeling attacked by all the commotion, the writer forbade publishing her diary during her lifetime.
Two years after her death, in 2003, Anonymous's diary reappeared on the bookshelf. Time had done its job. By now, Germany had largely accepted its past. The diary became an outright bestseller. And Anonyma finally got a face:Marta Hillers, journalist and photographer and an avid supporter of National Socialism during the war.
Anonymous. Eine Frau in Berlin
In 2008, the German filmmaker Max Färberböck made a film about the diary:Anonyma. Eine Frau in Berlin . There is no emotion or sentimentality in the book. The writer is not concerned with victimization, but with insight into what is happening. She shows that people in extraordinary circumstances use extraordinary survival strategies," said Färberböck at the beginning of this year in Het Parool. The film hides nothing. It shows the horrors of war in general; the horrific sexual crimes of the Russian soldiers in particular. But also shows understanding for the feelings of revenge of the Russian soldiers. The filmmaker cleverly takes you into the musings and outlining the survival strategy of the protagonist. The viewer gets a clear picture of the chaos in the latter part of the Second World War. A time when the line between good and evil is blurring.
Criticism
Nevertheless, became Anonymous. Eine Frau in Berlin received in Germany. The critics of Die Zeit ('Flieh, wenn du kannst!') are enthusiastic. The film judges of Der Spiegel ('Vergewaltigungsdrama “Anonyma”:Tränen in rauchenden Trümmern') are quite negative, just like the review ('Kitsch und Vergewaltigung :Anonyma) and the Video-Filmkritik in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. Färberböck:'You never do well with historical films. Certainly not in Germany, where every historical film is sacked. Many German critics hate historical films. They don't want them made.”