Michael Kohlhaas

Published in 1810, Heinrich von Kleist's novella Michael Kohlhaas is not exactly an easy piece of literature. Several attempts have already been made, such as by Volker Schlöndorff in 1969, to translate the material into an adequate film language. Now French director Arnaud des Pallières has also tried his hand at the classic, with the energetic support of a superb ensemble of actors.

Des Pallières has moved the action from Brandenburg and Saxony to the French region of Cévennen. There, horse trader Michael Kohlhaas (Mads Mikkelsen) leads a modest but happy life with his wife Judith (Delphie Chuillot) and daughter Lisbeth (Mélusine Mayance). One day, when his path to the nearest market is blocked without legal justification, Kohlhaas is forced to leave two of his horses as pawns with the new baron's steward until he can arrange a pass. When he goes to redeem the horses, he finds that they are completely emaciated and battered by hard field work. When his suit for redress is unsuccessful, Judith tries to petition the princess for justice. But the woman is so badly injured by the princess's henchmen that she dies a short time later in her husband's arms. Wracked by the tragic loss and angered by injustice, Kohlhaas decides to take the law into his own hands. Together with his faithful and some rebels, he launches a campaign against those he blames for his wife's death.

This French version of Michael Kohlhaas thrives on two things: superb imagery and a first-rate ensemble of actors. This is led by Mads Mikkelsen with aplomb. Once again, the actor proves to be one of the greats of his profession, whereby his performance never overshadows that of the great supporting actors such as David Kross (The Reader), Bruno Ganz (Downfall) or David Bennent (The Tin Drum) and thus diminishes their intensity. High acting, embedded in images of a fascinatingly bleak beauty, makes the literary adaptation in these aspects quite a cinematic pleasure.

The staging of Arnaud des Pallières, on the other hand, more than does justice to the original in its heaviness. At many moments, the whole thing feels very artificial and unwieldy due to the characters' lack of words, making emotional access extremely difficult for the viewer. Moreover, there are also plot developments that you can actually only follow if you are already familiar with the story. Of course, a movie doesn't always have to chew everything out and explain it in detail to its viewers. But here, the director overdid it a bit with his reduction of dialogues. So the viewer is constantly challenged to ensure that his attention, built up by the acting and great images, does not turn into yawning boredom.

To appreciate this adaptation of Michael Kohlhaas as the work of art that the director wanted to create with his high ambitions, you should definitely have a soft spot for so visually powerful as wordless program cinema fare, which comes along emotionally a bit undercooled. No easy feel-good cinema, but alone because of the great actors for Kleist lovers and friends of the European art film well worth seeing!

An article by Frankfurt-Tipp