Hansel: Good

Maurice and Halder’s friendship starts out with Maurice being the more youthful character, wanting to live freely and spontaneously.  Maurice is sort of the hothead as some would put it.  Halder, however is the one who gets stepped on by life in the sense that he tries very hard to keep things going well for himself, which is exhibited in scene four in which he is hectically trying to take care of his mother while running a family.  He is tied down with more responsibility.  As the film continues and Halder becomes an SS officer, the roles begin to switch in the sense that Halder eventually loses his family for a younger woman, thus voiding responsibility.  He eventually does not have to take care of his mother anymore.  Maurice, on the other hand is being stepped on and discriminated by the increasing power of the Nazi Party.  The ultimate switching of roles is the scene in which Maurice, trying to keep what shred of dignity he has, begs Halder multiples times to purchase a train ticket to Paris for him.  We see Maurice belittled, similarly to Halder’s fear and belittlement in scene one.  Even the shots are similar:  in the way that Halder was projecting his discomfort at the beginning of the scene while sitting across from the SS officer, Maurice project his sitting across from a new, changed Halder.  The film depicts how their decisions put them in different situations, as well.  Halder cracks and joins the party, thus giving him privileges.  Maurice stays strong in his beliefs, even hard-headed, while under the pressure and does not finally decided to move out until it is too late for him to even acquire a ticket out of the country.  Good is a scathing commentary on human nature under extreme social conditions such as the Holocaust.  One would normally think that staying strong under pressure and fighting the flawed system would end up positively for a man’s well being.  Maurice’s evolution through the film shows how this proves untrue.  Similarly, Halder’s seemingly immoral decisions prove beneficial in the social sense.  Both of them suffer in the psychological sense, however.  Therein lies the horror of the Holocaust.  The film also might cause the viewer to think the he or she would never act as Halder did.  His decisions cannot be viewed as such, however, because people such as college students today have no idea what it is like to live under the conditions that Germans did in the 30’s.  

This film reminded me of a book I had read around eighth grade, titled The Wave.  Good and The Wave are similar in the fact that they both show how easy it is to get caught up in grouping. Also, they both exhibit the acceptance of those in the groups and the mistreatment of those who refuse to join the groups.    

 

Now how do you argue with such a noble cause as that?

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