The Berlin Affair is the third adaption of Jun’ichirō Tanizaki’s novel, Manji that I’ve seen. It is the weakest adaption so far by a considerable amount. Mostly, the film follows the source material closely. Except that this adaption is an English language story that takes place in Nazi Germany for no real reason.
Like all adaptions, Manji focuses on a four-way bisexual love affair that features manipulation, suicide and lots of sex. Louise Von Hollendorf narrates the events of this version of the story. In 1938, Louise is married to a Nazi diplomat named Heinz. Louise meets a Japanese woman named Mitsuko and develops a relationship with her. Heinz obviously disapproves of his wife’s sapphic affair. Mitsuko has a lover named Joseph who she strings along.Joseph sees Louise as his rival for Mitsuko’s affection. When Heinz eventually confronts Mitsuko, she draws him into her web as well. Heinz too falls for Mitsuko and we get the beginnings of some sort of triad. But Mitsuko, Heiz and Louise take a fatalistic view of their complicated, bisexual extramarital love triangle. They quickly start considering whether there is any future for them or if the way forward is suicide.
It’s understandable that European director Liliana Cavani might switch the setting of Manji to somewhere in Europe. But its setting in Nazi Germany feels like little more than window dressing. It also lends itself too easily to comparisons with Liliana Cavani’s most notable feature, The Night Porter. That film was also a very unhealthy romance featuring death and Nazis. The Night Porter is genuinely controversial and challenging. The Berlin Affair perhaps tries too hard to court the same level of artistic controversy. But it’s not that controversial. It doesn’t focus on Nazi atrocities like The Night Porter did. The Berlin Affair’s main point of controversy is homosexuality. None of this is remotely as challenging as The Night Porter’s romance between a concentration camp guard and former inmate. The Berlin Affair seems to want to have that same level of edge but simply doesn’t.
While the film’s location moved to Germany, Mitsuko remains a Japanese character. And boy, did The Berlin Affair do her dirty. Mitsuko’s primary trait is being Japanese. She dresses in Kimonos and speaks constantly of Japanese tradition and culture. It never goes much deeper than that. Previous adaptions of Manji take place in Japan. So Mitsuko doesn’t have to act as a token Japanese person. Those Mitsukos get a lot more depth and personality. I didn’t want to call this film racist, but the film kept being kinda racist. There’s a voiceover where Louise says, “for a Japanese, suicide is victory.” This is followed by a scene of Mitsuko dressing like a geisha for no real reason. This is also the most demure and submissive version of Mitsuko so far. And I think that’s likely connected to how much this version of the character leans on Japanese stereotypes.
The Berlin Affair gets less interesting as it goes on. All of its controversy is offered early on with the interracial lesbianism and whatnot. Previous versions of Manji build up tension as the characters hurtle towards a shocking conclusion. But this one lost me. Maybe it’s because I’ve seen this story before, but I was dead bored by the third act. It doesn’t feel like it builds tension. It mostly feels like more of the same. The Berlin Affair plays its hand too early with the drama and controversy. There’s nowhere for it to really go as it goes on.
The only reason The Berlin Affair isn’t getting a negative review is because Jun’ichirō Tanizaki’s original story is too solid to make this an overtly bad film. But this is by far the weakest adaption I’ve seen. The 1964 version of Manji is beautiful to look at. The 1983 version takes liberties with the source material. That makes it feel fresh and original. It’s also pretty nuts. This 1985 version is neither as beautiful as the 1964 version nor as original and crazy as the 1983 version. It’s also obviously, a much shallower depiction of Japanese characters to the point of racism. If you haven’t seen other adaptions, it’s a fine movie because it’s got good source material to work from. But there’s really no reason to watch this version of Manji when two much better ones did it first.
Overall rating: 5.0/10
Other WLW films in similar genres
Period dramas based on novels
Married couples +1
I found your nice article googling what was the original language of Berlin Affair. The German version seemed logical for me to be the undubbed version. It turns out that the movie setting is Germany, but recorded in Italy and strangely spoken in English! I didn’t even know there are two (better) movies before. I’ll watch them eventually. When I first (secretly) watched this movie I was like 14-16 year old, and was impressed not only by the few restrained and awkward erotic scenes, but by the whole love triangle idea between a man and two women (a common male sexual cliche). As time passed, I was able to build a more mature view of this movie, and it lost much of the charm I used to see in it. The characters are very shallow, as well as most role interpretations (even Gudrum Landgrebe beeing a very good actress). I do agree that Mitsuko is a stereotyped submissive japanese, and the Nazi setting doesn’t contributte much. There’s still some good points, photography is beautiful and music sounds very good to me. Thanks for the post.