Abschied (1968)

The year is 1914. Young Hans Gastl packs his things and leaves. Meanwhile, his father, who works as a public prosecutor in Munich, rages against his wayward son, while his mother has given up. The maid Christine fetches an imperial flag and proudly announces that Liège has fallen. Hans takes his leave in his heart of his family, his friends, and the life he has known. And he looks back. Even as a schoolboy, it was clear that he was cut from a different cloth from the rest of his bourgeois class. He was friends with Hartinger, a worker’s son, and egged him on to all sorts of mischief. Hans stole money from his grandmother and persuaded Hartinger to skip school with him and spend the money at the fair. In the end, Hartinger was beaten by the teacher for being a thief and the instigator of the truancy. Even when Hans confessed that he had been the instigator and the thief, no one believed him, since the son of a public prosecutor would never do such a thing. His status-conscious and passionately militaristic father took the boy on hiking trips where they acted out battle scenes. Sometimes Hans made a fool of his father, mock-threatening him for fun. On a family holiday, Hans developed a childish crush on the housemaid, Fräulein Klärchen. He gave her flowers, and the two of them read books together. His father insisted that Klärchen be dismissed immediately and suspected that his son had been having an affair with the young woman. Several years pass. Hans is now attending a Gymnasium and is one of its worst students. He likes writing poems, which his father tries to stop him from doing, and spends time with his even worse classmates, Feck and Freyschlag, whose crude pranks both attract and repel him. When Feck asks him for money, Hans once again steals from his grandmother. She reports him to his parents, and Father Gastl takes action: Hans is sent to the Johannespensionat, a boarding school for difficult children from the upper classes, where iron discipline prevails. Hans pulls himself together and discovers a passion for swimming. He becomes so good at it that he even wins a German championship and is personally honored by Prince Alfons. Hans is allowed to return home. Under Feck’s influence, he discovers women and begins an affair with Fanny Fuß, a tobacco seller and former prostitute. He spends the night at her place, but a short time later she is murdered by her pimp, Kunik. Father Gastl is horrified that his son had been involved with the woman, but does everything he can to keep details of his son’s interrogation from reaching the public, since his own reputation would be at risk as well. The judge questioning Hans, for his part, is much more interested in probing his relationship with Hartinger. Along with his Jewish friend Löwenstein, Hartinger is one of Hans’s closest friends, since Hans has meanwhile had to leave school without graduating because of his poor marks. He now often spends time at the Café Größenwahn, where he recites his own poems and is welcomed into the circle of the writer Sack, the singer Magda, and Hoch, who is addicted to cocaine. One day, news reaches the café patrons that Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife have been murdered. The war, long thought impossible, suddenly arrives, and the enthusiasm among most of the city’s young men knows no bounds. Feck and Freyschlag, who, like Hans, had failed their final exams, have received emergency school-leaving certificates and volunteered for the war. Löwenstein, too, is soon sitting on a train to the front as a soldier. His mother had insisted that he enlist so that people would not say Jews were shirking military service. Only Hartinger and Hans remain behind, though Hans cannot believe Hartinger’s claim that so many Social Democrats oppose the war. His parents have just returned from a long vacation. His father believes that Hans has volunteered for military service and is proud of him. His mother packs Hans’s things, even though she knows he will not go to war. Hans finally tells his father that he will not take part in “your war.” Hans packs his things and leaves for good. Meanwhile, his father rages against his wayward son, while his mother has given up.