Booming Berlin

1920s Berlin was a booming period with the powers of German expressionist art and heavy industrialization permeating the city. Ruttmann’s Berlin very much exemplifies those characteristics. The film follows in the style of Vertov’s Man with a Movie Camera by using avant-garde techniques such as, splicing video, superimposing film, and bearing the device, to parallel the advancements from the wake of industrialization. Many of the scenes show the overwhelming volumes of transportation and activity that consume the public realm. Much of the music is used to mirror the bombastic, heavy machinery. The title names Berlin a “great” city, which under a German context does not have a measure of moral justness, but instead refers to having strong power. This brings about a strong subjectivity on the perception of Berlin from the film, as many shots can now be reinterpreted as attempts to awe and impress the audience. The poetic Berlin is now suddenly only a subjective fragment of the true fabric of Berlin.

______________________________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________

Ruttman’s fragment reverberates the world context of Berlin but also contains hidden aspects of other components of the city that are not highlighted. For example, the city, as much of the rest of the world at the time, is heavily male-oriented. Few scenes show women in leadership positions, but there many male train conductors, and male factory managers depicted. The film also lacks the Nazism overtone that was occurring at the time. Doblin’s Berlin Alexanderplatz, written in a montage style, has a snippet of a pro-Nazi speech that occurs in the large square. A moment in Ruttman’s film captures a similar scene of passionate oration but fails to hint at the context of the speech losing the potential to tie the political movement to Ruttman’s Berlin.

______________________________________________________________________________

Berlin of today is very different, as a few years after the release of the film, Hitler’s regime took control and began WWII. That moment in history has defined much of the current public realm, as the Berlin in the movie has a distinctive sense of a loss time. The lack of Nazism in the film creates an encapsulation of Berlin before such a defining moment took place. In retrospect, Ruttman’s Berlin: Symphony of a Great City was aptly timed to enshrine the great city before it was lost.