The Wave

An interesting film, in many ways similar to American History X, mainly because it can easily serve as a film intended to be shown in schools and can be contemplated and discussed during civics lessons. Unfortunately, just like its American sibling, it suffers from simplification and schematism, which detracts from its persuasiveness and authenticity. I do not diminish the impact of The Wave and what it wants to convey, as it does so clearly and effectively. But in reality, it wouldn't work like this. The point is that a similar pathological process could occur somewhere in a closed community without access to the media and disruptive influences of relatives, friends, and state power. The present time does not favor totalitarian ideologies based on mass participation at all, because it is highly atomized due to the information explosion and the ubiquitous influence of the media. These students are of different nationalities, religions, and cultures, and the cohesive element is harder to find than in the 1930s. Moreover, the film directed by Dennis Gansel suffers from the overblown ending with the smell of gunpowder and iron on the hands. It is probably because the message to teenagers had to be as powerful as possible, but in this case, less would have been more. Overall impression: 65%. (05/05/2011)

The Wave isn't a bad or even mediocre film. I was deciding between a four and three star rating the whole time I was watching it. It ended up as you see it, and I will try to justify it in bullets. 1) The oft-mentioned short time from the inception of an idea to its ultimate gradation. 5 days is unrealistic even in first grade elementary school. The way Vogel's character achieves this points to the fact that each of the students is flustered by something to the point of being able to deny their individuality because of it, and in less than a week. In doing so, he makes complete fools of everyone in the film. In fact, I am of the opinion that it is in puberty and adolescence that people are most autonomous in their lives. I'm not going to believe that on the third day a class of thirty completely different students (hopers, punks, etc.) would put on white shirts. 2) The film helps itself quite a bit in that almost all of the students express themselves in terse, bare-bones sentences. It thus makes their arguments easily contestable and, in my opinion, unrealistically leaves them to settle for the simplest explanation. Some of the rebuttals are not even answered and no one finds this strange. 3) The characters are simple and incredibly boilerplate. The viewer recognizes the liberal immediately by his dreadlocks and his Palestine. They express themselves in the exact stereotypical terms that anyone would assign to their style. In fact, The Wave has all the types a teen comedy or slasher has to have. Even with the same behavior. But the stupid thing is just that all these different types don't react differently to The Wave and don't bring anything from their "branch" to it. This is due to the sheer fucked up psychology of the characters and visible simplification for the purposes of the film. 4) The graphic depiction of some situations borders on American big-movie literalism. I am referring in particular to the scene where a girl with a blood-red T-shirt walks into a classroom full of students in white shirts. 5) The conciliatory and inadequately gradated (despite an almost spasmodic effort) ending destroys any attempt to shock, reveal, or chill us about the way we are. — All in all, The Wave is a film that could easily have been more interesting if it had treated the subject in theoretical terms in the space of one classroom and three hours. I would have believed its message far better. (25/02/2011)

Finally our school sent us to watch a good film. The manipulation of the students to turn them into fanatics is shown very fast to meet the needs of the 100 minute runtime, but it still fulfils its purpose. The wave is not surprising, the outcome is predictable almost from the beginning, but the last five minutes or so are quite intense. (07/11/2008)

A great movie about the fact that a well-intentioned idea in the hands of well-intentioned people can go beyond the imaginable. The uneasy feeling from all this is amplified by the fact that the story itself takes place in Germany, and we all know how far this was taken by the Germans. However, it's not about the nation but about the people. You just need to find the right ones and it turns into a problem from which it's hard to find a way back. WW2 was supposed to be a lesson for everyone, and this movie shows on a smaller scale that there are still people with the right idea for the right people. 4 stars. (10/01/2012)

They could’ve gone a step further with such a strong and compelling topic and stayed at the school desk and avoid dragging it into “everyday life" (I think the debate scenes in the classroom during the first two days of the project are the most powerful part of the movie). But it does fulfil the purpose of being disturbing while not being tedious to a t and, considering it is not exactly a picture where “you forget what it was about the minute the credits stop rolling", it actually works out perfectly. I just envisioned it would be more theoretical. La resistance! (25/01/2009)