THE NINTH DAY

Luxembourg/Germany, 2004, 90 minutes, Colour.
Directed by Volker Schlondorff.

The Ninth Day concerns OCIC (the former Organisation Catholique du Cinema Internationale) and SIGNIS (the present World Catholic Association for Communication).

It is based on a short memoir written by Fr Jean Bernard at the end of World War II, after his release from Dachau. At the outbreak of war, the OCIC Secretariat in Brussels was occupied by the Germans. Jean Bernard was the secretary general. Abbe Brohee, the president, remained during the war years as chaplain to a convent outside the city. He died in 1946. Jean Bernard had returned to his native Luxembourg. However, he was arrested at the French border and sent to Dachau. OCIC was targeted by the Germans as it had not spoken out in favour of the occupying forces and Jean Bernard had written articles which were interpreted as critical of the regime.

After the war, Jean Bernard went to Switzerland to recuperate but was back in Brussels by 1946 preparing for a congress. He became president of OCIC in 1947 and remained in that position until 1972. During his presidency, OCIC began its jury work at world film festivals, in Venice in 1948, Cannes in 1952, Berlin in 1954. During the 1950s, juries were established in Spain and in Latin America. There was also an annual Grand Prix. Winners of this award included La Strada (1954), On the Waterfront (1955), The Prisoner (1956).

Jean Bernard contributed to church thinking on media at the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965) and in subsequent years. He also steered OCIC through difficult times when there was strong questioning of its decisions, a prize to Pasolini’s Teorema in Venice, 1969, and to John Schlesinger’s Midnight Cowboy in Berlin, 1970. After his retirement he returned to Luxembourg and worked for Catholic media. He also hosted several OCIC meetings there. He died in 1994.

Jean Bernard never revealed the reason for the nine day leave he was given from Dachau in January 1942. The screenplay for the film, The Ninth Day, speculates and creates a plausible fiction. In the film, Bernard is called Henri Kremer (played by Ulrich Matthes). He comes from a respectable family, his brother an industrialist working for the regime. Kremer has been told by a young SS officer (August Diehl) to visit the Archbishop (who has retreated to his home, refusing to collaborate) and persuade him to support the occupying administration and save the Catholic Church, promising that in the post-war Reich the Church would play a significant role. The varying opinions about the role of Pius XII are discussed. If Kremer does not return by the ninth day, the priests in Dachau will be executed.

Distinguished German director, Volker Schlondorff, has made an intelligent drama that raises the principal issues of the war in Europe: Aryan supremacy, the extermination of the Jews, occupying forces and government, collaboration and resistance, torture and executions, the role of religion and the Catholic Church. The young SS officer (who is revealed to have been a seminarian and ordained deacon but who opted for the Reich to better the world) argues that Jesus went beyond Judaism and that this was the vision of Judas, that his ‘betrayal’ of Jesus and his own past was a heroic action. Kremer returns to Dachau.

Audiences have seen concentration camp films for many decades. Schlondorff, however, brings a forcefully grim style to his sequences, including the crucifixion and crowning with barbs of a Polish priest. He also highlights the moral integrity of the prisoners, especially Kremer’s acknowledging to himself on his return that he is in the place where he should be, where God wanted him to be.

1.Impact of the story, the character of the priest? Luxembourg and Germany, Europe and World War Two? The impact of the film for Europeans, citizens of Luxembourg, for Germans? Going beyond Europe for a worldwide audience?

2.The film based on an actual event, characters, the invention of the story about the Nazis wanting the Archbishop of Luxembourg to collaborate? The role of the priest in trying to persuade them?

3.The film sixty years after the events, the memories of the war, the concentration camps, the Jews, Catholics, clergy, the churches? A message for the 21st century?

4.The re-creation of Dachau, outside, inside, the huts, the workplaces, the quarries, hard labour? The contrast with Luxembourg, its streets, homes, Cathedral, church, official buildings? The winter season and its bleakness?

5.The winter tones of the film, colours? The atmospheric score and its instruments, variety?

6.The structure of the film: Dachau and the credits, the glimpses of the treatment of the prisoners, discovering they were priests, the Nazi officers and their brutality, verbal and physical? The Polish priest, not singing the German song, his being crucified? His being left exposed? The specific days, going to Luxembourg and the nine days passing, the flashbacks, the dreams, the cumulative effect? Henri’s mission, the question whether he would return or not? The return and his feeling at home in the camp?

7.The priests, from Luxembourg, from Poland, the meagre Eucharist celebration, having to hide, living their religion and prayer, the crucifixion of the priest, the stances the priests took, the threats of death and torture?

8.Kremer, his appearance, exceedingly gaunt, the experience in Dachau, watching the crucifixion, his being taken out and thinking he would be crucified? The back-story of his studies, writings? Arrest? Thesis and intellectual discussion? The anti-Nazi stances? His support of the Jews, the discussion with the SS officer about Semitism and anti-Semitism, Jesus as a Jew, the argument about Judas, betrayal as the only way forward, Jesus to overcome his Jewish background? Kremer in Luxembourg, his family, his brother and working in industry, supporting the Germans? Offering him the car, the possibility of escape? The family fears with Henri’s return? The effect of Dachau on him, his perspective on life, suffering? His meeting with the vicar-general, asking for the appointment with the archbishop? The SS man, the explanation of the mission? His return to his family, his sister and her care, the brother-in-law and his fear? The older brother taking him in the car – and Henri stopping and returning? Encountering the SS and the physical abuse of his sister? The meeting with the archbishop, the discussions, the archbishop giving him the letter, his giving it to the SS officer? His return? Feeling at home in the camp with the priests?

9.The archbishop and his silence, policy, refusing to collaborate, staying in his house? The discussion with Kremer? The envelope with the blank page? The vicar-general, smooth, eager to collaborate? The consequences for the archbishop, for Luxembourg?

10.The issues of Pius X and the war, his friendship with Hitler, the greetings for Hitler’s birthday? The Vatican concordat with Germany? His silence? The arguments given for his silence, the Dutch bishops’ experience, the executions, the consequences of their speaking out? The pope’s priorities about the church? His attitude towards the Jews? The conduct of Pius XII and its being suggested as a pattern for the Archbishop of Luxembourg?

11.Luxembourg and Germany, Luxembourg being occupied, the administration, suffering, collaboration?

12.The Nazi officials, their cruelty in Dachau, the senior officers in Luxembourg, the threats to the junior staff, the staff in the offices?

13.The SS officer, his age, experience, having been in the east, the mission to persuade Kremer to see the archbishop? Tactics, smooth argument, threats, the revelation of his Catholic background, his diaconate, his leaving before ordination, thinking he would do better change the world as an SS officer, Aryan supremacy? His Judas argument? His genuflecting in the church, talking with the vicar-general? Ultimately frustrated? The threat of his being returned to the east? The archbishop’s blank page?

14.The portrait of the Kremer family, Henri’s sister, the dead mother, his not being at the funeral, she being Henri’s conscience, the flowers at the grave, his continual visits to her? Her principles, the appeal of the SS? The violent slap for his sister, her arrest? The effect of Henri’s return? The brother-in-law and his fear? The brother, the elegant meal with the SS officer, the eggs, the deferential waiter? The sense of menace?

15.A retrospect on wars in the 20th century, German arrogance, the Aryan issues, the persecution of the Jews? Using religion and propaganda? Promises for the place of the Catholic church in the Third Reich? Luxembourg and its stances? Presentation of a hero of Luxembourg in Henri Kremer?

16.The image of the priest in the 20th century, the collapse of the image and of its pedestal at the end of the century, the beginning of the 21st century? The theme of the priest as another Christ, suffering, even to death? The fact that Henri Kramer survived, the consequences of his experience in Dachau?