Transit (2018)

Becoming an expatriate comes with a host of challenges, and sometimes with benefits. Yet, the word fails to establish a solid semantic relation to the concrete ‘reality’ to which it is meant to refer. This is because people leave their ‘home’ for all sorts of reasons, and by whatever means available to them. For some, the move is by their choice; for others, it is forced by circumstances. Yet, for the silent majority, the decision is not theirs to make. And the silence that is systematically forced upon them must haunt us.

Christian Petzold’s acclaimed feature, Transit, attempts to illuminate what it means to have an ability to make ‘choices’ by giving a voice to the silenced through the eyes of an individual. It is based on the novel by Anna Seghers of the same name; the German-Jewish author composed a hollowing story of escape and survival, drawn upon her experience under the Vichy France.

A young German expatriate (Franz Rogowski) enters a café as the film opens. He cuts a lonely figure against the dire backdrop of the French capital fallen to the Fascist occupation force. Despite the mounting tension and chaos, he appears utterly unconcerned; he sports the look of someone who is fatigued, bitter, and completely indifferent to his personal fate and the world in which he inhabits. Indifferent, that is, for the time being.

Moments later, he was approached by Paul (Sebastian Hülk), who seems to be a well-connected figure amongst the German expatriate community in Paris. The young protagonist, who is called ‘Georg’, greets Paul with open contempt. With the composure worthy of a seasoned politician, Paul effortlessly overlooks the rancour and proceeds with a proposition; if ‘Georg’ does him a favour and delivers the letters addressed to a renowned German author, Franz Weidel, he will be offered a spot on the vehicle with which German opposition figures plan to escape to Marseille, from where they would evade the reach of European Fascists by emigrating far and away from the Continent.

It is not clear how they came to know one another. Paul is a respected figure within the German expat opposition, a small group of politically insignificant intelligentsia hunted down by the Fascists, and ‘Georg’ expresses defiant disdain toward this class, the hostility that happens to be shared by their pursuers. Despite his apparent status as someone who needs to run from the authority, our protagonist seems indifferent to politics at this juncture. And yet, the circumstances force these ‘friends’ together in a foreign capital: Paul needs ‘Georg’ to do his bidding, while ‘Georg’ needs a spot on a vehicle to evade the prospect of immediate arrest. Naturally, the proposition comes with a condition: Paul emphasises that he can guarantee only one spot, implying that ‘Georg’ needs to ditch his ‘friend’, Heinz, whom Paul refers as a ‘baggage’ that has been ‘weighing down’ the young man. Unsurprisingly, ‘Georg’ responds with his entrenched cynicism: he affirms that he has no longer anything to do with Heinz, and accepts the offer.

When he arrives at the hotel with the letters, the hostess (Émilie de Preissac) immediately recognises his German accent. Suspecting him as a plain cloth Gestapo, she begins to nervously utter that everything is in order and the premise is compliant with the German policies. When ‘Georg’ asks for a room, she immediately leads him to the best room available. As she prepares the room with a view, ‘Georg’ takes liberties and goes inside the room where the writer, the recipient of the letters he was instructed to deliver, stays.

To his disappointment, there is no sign of the occupant. The curiosity prompts him to examine the room. Amongst papers on a writing desk, ‘Georg’ finds Weidel’s manuscript, and the immigration papers which appear to guarantee the safe passage to Mexico for the author and his spouse. It is clear that someone pulled a string to arrange everything for his safety; the author and his wife will leave Marseille to Mexico via a transit to the United States, which, tellingly, is not their final destination, suggesting Weidel’s tie to the German communist elements. And yet, there is another paper that attracts his attention: a letter from the author’s wife. It states briefly that their life together is over.

As he prepares himself to leave, he unwittingly glimpses the tragedy that took place: the bathroom wall is smeared with blood. There is no body from which it flowed. The hostess is terrified to find the German there and immediately spills out everything to him: she found the German author cut his wrist in the bath tab when she checked in, as he failed to appear for breakfast. Terrified, she confesses what she had done so far to conceal this ‘incident’ that could get her persecuted by the occupation authority: after all, she kept, albeit briefly, a major German opposition figure under her care without proper paperworks. She has already disposed of the body with the help of someone who has access to a mortuary: he will be buried in an unmarked grave somewhere in Paris. When ‘Georg’ asks about Weidel’s manuscript and immigration papers, she asks him to take them with him, the offer which ‘Georg’ happily accepts: under the dire circumstances, both are trying their best to survive.

Throughout the course of the film, we will learn very little about our protagonist. The only statement about himself ‘Georg’ allows slipping is that he used to be an electric technician. Aside from this bit of information, we learn nothing of his past. How has he come to find himself on a run from the German authority? Was he a part of labour movement, or, a member of German Communist Party? Is he a deserter, or a conscientious objector? Or, was he, perhaps, a petty criminal who ran from the law to the foreign land? Whatever the reason for him to evade the authority may be, one thing is clear: ‘Georg’ is a cynical drifter with no particular purpose or belief. The course of action he undertakes is guided by his desire to run from the German authority. In this, he is not alone; everyone he encounters shares the same desire and acts on it unreservedly. Yet, there is a clear disdain in his eyes when he meets his ‘fellow fugitives’. It is clear that this hostile negativity toward those who are on the run is the projection of self-loathing. He hates himself for the powerlessness that has reduced him to act only for self-preservation. He hates others for they act as his mirror.

When he discovers Paul amongst the dissidents arrested by the French police force outside the café they met, he runs to the home of a French family who has been concealing Heinz, who suffers from a severe leg injury, likely from a gun shot. He has not only lost his mobility; his wound is now infected and causing severe fever. The husband, a French sympathiser, tells ‘Georg’ that it is no longer safe to be there: not for Heinz, not for himself and his family. The French man decides to drive them to the railway hub, from where ‘Georg’ and Heinz would travel inside a cargo to Marseille, the major port city still independent of German occupation for the time being. As ‘Georg’ repeatedly protests by raising the strong probability of Heinz dying during the trip, the French insists that ‘Georg’ assists him regardless. It is clear that the French wishes to be rid of Heinz, and so does ‘Georg’. Sadly, their wish comes true: Heinz dies before the cargo train arrives at Marseille. As the French police sweeps the cargos, ‘Georg’ manages to escape to the city.

Once in Marseille, ‘Georg’ takes measures to secure the safe passage to Mexico via the United States, by assuming the identity of the dead German author. He also visits Heinz’ wife and son to inform of his untimely death. Despite his growing affection for Heinz’ son, Driss (Lilien Batman), the young German is determined to leave the Continent for his safety. Due to the international statue of the dead author, ‘Georg’ is granted the audience with Mexican and American consulate generals with little difficulty. He retrieves what is ‘his’ by cashing out the money order prepared for ‘him’, and enjoys what would be his last days in Europe, regularly haunts a café with charming decor. It appears that, for the first time in his life, by becoming someone he is not, everything begins to work in his favour. He has the respect of the prominent members of the society, has money that affords him comfort, and enjoys the prospect of finally ridding of someone whom he hates the most: himself. Notice that this notion of ‘freedom’ by means of stealing someone else’s life is a persistent theme of modern literature. Many authors diagnosed the psychology of the deceptive misrepresentation of personal identity as a distinctly modern malady. For example, in the Talented Mr Ripley, Patricia Highsmith analysed the protagonist’s twisted desire to become another person: Tom’s desire to become Dickie Greenleaf is not driven solely by economic concerns; he literally wanted to become the object of his desire by replacing him as if he cannibalises the very person whom he desires. Although Thomas Ripley is an extreme example of modern character study, the sinister nature of this distinctly modern characteristics is also noted by others, such as Charles Dickens (e.g., Our Mutual Friend), to name a few. And this characterisation of ‘modern psychology’ is alive and well today: Don Draper (Jon Hamm) of the popular TV series Mad Men found success by first stealing someone else’s identity amongst the Fog of War in the Korean Peninsula. Like these ‘modern men’, ‘Georg’ is steely in his pursuit of ‘freedom’; he single-mindedly conditions his escape. Nothing will deter him from claiming what is not his, that is, until he encounters someone in the city in transition.

The moment ‘Georg’ steps into the street of Marseille, a young woman in a smart attire (Paula Beer) approaches him. The moment he turns to her, her joyful expression dissipates: she is simply mistaken ‘Georg’ for someone else. It turns out that her name is Marie Weidel: she is the ‘widow’ of the German author whose last manuscript, immigration papers, and identity ‘Georg’ has taken for himself. It appears that Marie had a second thought on their purportedly broken marriage: in the letter ‘Georg’ was to deliver to Weidel, she begs him to follow her to Marseille, to be with her forever. She needs her husband; she cannot live without him.

And yet, the reasons for her sudden ‘change of heart’ is more complicated than a popular melodrama would have you. Whilst she may indeed have changed her mind about her husband, according to her present lover, Richard (Godehard Giese), Marie needs the immigration paper possessed by ‘Weidel’ to escape to Mexico; she cannot arrive at the final destination without the paperwork that secures her transit to the United States, thereby rendering her dramatic disembarkment from the ship to America less melodramatic; she simply feared that, without proper paperworks, she would be simply deported back to France, the trip that ensures her place in a German concentration camp.

Thanks to Paula Beer’s masterful artistry, however, Marie Weidel remains opaque throughout the duration of the drama. Her feelings toward her husband, her present-time lover, and the protagonist are unclear at best, and, at times, downright confusing. She appears as someone who wears her heart on sleeve; she is frantically impulsive in that one cannot imagine her manipulating ‘three men’ in her present life to her advantage. Having not been informed of her husband’s untimely death, she is determined to find him. To what end? That we do not know. She seems genuinely affectionate when she speaks of him, yet she is clearly attached to Richard as she flirts with ‘Georg’ whom she has mistaken as her husband upon more than two occasions. Whilst it is possible for humans to simultaneously direct one’s affection toward multiple individuals, it is not possible to do so without certain manipulations if one is to hold these complexities together. What is striking about Marie is that she seems completely incapable of doing so; she in fact cannot hold anything together. She does not know what she wants, and she does not know what to do with her affections toward these personalities that she has happened to encounter. Like everyone else, she is someone on the run. Yet, her fear appears to be of personal nature; perhaps she is someone who is afraid to be alone. Hence, she is helpless and trembles like grass in the wind that constantly changes direction.

Whilst Marie may be outstanding in her charming insanity, the rest of the personalities in this story are also torn apart by fear. As they have not yet deported to the German concentration camps, they can still make choices to some degree. Our protagonist’s acquaintance kills off the dogs she was entrusted by her patrons before committing suicide. Driss and his mother leave Marseille in their attempt to cross the Franco-Spanish border over the Pyrenees. Richard was compelled to disembark the ship to the United States to be with Marie despite his fear of the advancing German force, if only for temporarily before he leaves again. Georg’ decides not to disclose to Marie her husband’s death, and continues to hope to take the dead husband’s place to be with Marie. Yet, these choices and actions cannot conceal a stark reality: under the existential threat posed by the menace of totalitarianism, the ‘choices’ these characters make are not really choices at all. Facing the crushing force of the terror state which denies any possibility of descent by eroding one’s capacity for agency, the regime murders the very possibility of humanity before murdering their physical existence en masse.

Yet, it turns out that, our capacity for love, the quintessential human quality, is surprisingly resilient. Our protagonist, a bitter and disillusioned drifter seemingly beyond any hope of resurrection, becomes predictably attracted to Marie, and unexpectedly falls in love with her. His feeling for her is inexplicably genuine to the point where, for seemingly the first time in his life, he places her needs above his. ‘Georg’ cannot bring himself to disclose the death of Weidel; seeing Marie’s jubilation at the prospect of seeing her husband again, he is simply unable to burst her bubble and chooses to continue the balancing act of keeping alive her hopes of seeing Weidel again, and finding the ways in which Marie and Richard may secure the passage to Mexico by using the false identity of her husband to secure the transit to the United States. Despite himself, he chooses to help the distressed lovers by means of a proposition: he persuades Richard to leave first by promising to follow him to Mexico. With the transit visas to the United States, he, as the ‘dead’ author, can bring Marie to him. When this plot fails and Richard has to risk the arrest by being forced to take another ship later, he decides to give up his place for the sake of Marie: he sends Richard to the departing ship to claim his spot. Suddenly, ‘Georg’ thus regains his agency; despite the existential threat to his person, the young German fugitive selects a certain path so that his actions and choices are truly his own. Thus, despite his awareness that he could claim Marie by taking advantage of her vulnerable state, he resists her seduction; he allows himself only to be kind toward her, for he knows that he is not the one she needs.

In the end, his sacrifice does not save the day. Despite his efforts, fate proves to be indifferent to his hopes and fears. Whilst ‘Georg’ is denied of consolation from his noble deed, in the face of the violent force beyond his control, he did choose to act to care for someone out of disinterested love. Once he learns that there is nothing more he could do for her, he returns to his regular haunt, alone, refusing to go on hiding. Despite everything, ‘Georg’ appears content. Indeed, in the last moment of the film, he appears like a lover expecting his significant other. Then, whom is he really expecting? What does he think he could meet in the city under the German control?

Whilst we won’t know the answer to this question, one thing is clear: accepting the ‘fate’ is now his own choice. Because ‘Georg’ is no longer afraid; he has something that cannot be taken away, that is, his agency despite the existential threat that severely limits the range of actions he could take. Yet, the restriction does not grant the triumph for the power that is intent on destroying the very notion of human agency by ‘cleansing’ those who strive to uphold it. Our protagonist has already made the most difficult choice: to choose someone else’s life over his own.

Tellingly, his last ‘action’ is to do nothing. Once his reason to act is gone, he choses to sit in the café where Marie once embraced him so passionately. He now waits calmly for what may follow. He is secretly hoping to have another glimpse of Marie, who, for the first time in his life, gave his life a meaning.

At the last moment of the film, Rogowski becomes the embodiment of the rarest of human quality: the defiant serenity in the face of stark violent force, This wholesome humanity was inspired by his disinterested love, the profound awakening that transformed a dejected drifter. If the look on his face in the final moment of this moving film does not make the case for ethics as the guiding principle of human actions, I do not know what would.