A good man can only do so much in John Rabe.
The good German
By Don Simpson
The titular hero of Florian Gallenberger’s John Rabe (Ulrich Tukur) is a German businessman and card-carrying Nazi who has resided with his wife, Dora (Dagmar Manzel), in Nanking, China for over 20 years while managing the Siemens power plant. It is now December 1937 and the Imperial Japanese Army is preparing to invade Nanking just as Siemens is planning to return Rabe to Germany.
The Japanese Army strikes before Rabe leaves Nanking and Rabe uses his Nazi ties, or at least his humungous Nazi flag, and the axis of the German-Japanese alliance to create a safety zone for Chinese innocents within the Nanking city limits. During the subsequent six-week long “Rape of Nanking,” over two hundred thousand Chinese were sheltered in the safety zone by Rabe and his cohorts, including the American doctor, Robert Wilson (Steve Buscemi), and the Frenchwoman, Valérie Dupres (Anne Consigny).
Rabe begins the film as a loyal German colonialist with a condescending attitude toward his dimwitted Chinese workers; then, as the film progresses, Rabe very slowly evolves into the passionate and paternal hero of the Chinese. Despite Rabe’s truly honorable humanitarian efforts, the American doctor tirelessly heckles Rabe scene after scene after scene. Dr. Wilson might be echoing the skepticism of the audience towards Rabe’s allegiance, but this obvious narrative device, presumably to help transform the Nazi into a victim for the audience to sympathize, becomes quite tedious all too quickly.
Where John Rabe takes a serious misstep is in spending too much time (and budget) focusing on the violent shenanigans of the Japanese Army rather than keeping with a singular claustrophobic perspective from inside the safety zone. In doing so, John Rabe loses all sense of realism and Gallenberger is forced to use cheap and overt tactics to drum up sentimentality (a la Steven Spielberg). If we only saw what Rabe witnessed first-hand then John Rabe would probably be more effective. What do all of the strategic meetings of the Japanese officers have to do with John Rabe’s story anyway
Haunting images of the senseless slaughter by the Japanese, including piles of executed Chinese bodies and rows of severed Chinese heads, seem to almost reduce the significance of Rabe’s heroics, partly because (despite the numbers he saved) countless Chinese died because of selfish risks taken while under his watch, but also because the uber-violent images would have turned even the most passive onlooker into a savior. In other words, Gallenberger’s Rabe became a hero only because he had no other option, not because he wanted to become one.
The strong acting performances in John Rabe make it even more unfortunate that this amazing and heartwarming story became so misguided under the helm of Gallenberger. Trimmed down from 134 minutes to approximately 100 minutes -- editing out at the very minimum all of the scenes taking place without Rabe -- John Rabe could probably be more effective and meaningful, but in its current incarnation it meanders off target a few too many times.
