Europa Europa

The original German-speaking title of this 1990 film is ‘Hitlerjunge Solomon’ which roughly translates into ‘Solomon of the Hitler youth.’ Although perhaps not as punchy a title, it sums up the main polt and theme of the film and characterises Solomon as if he were playing a part or a character, which is essentially what he does. The film is based on the true memoirs of Solomon ‘Solek’ Perel, a Jewish boy who escaped detection by the Nazis during world war two through a mixture of plucky initiative and sheer luck. His story begins on Krystallnacht, during which his sister is killed and he and his family flee to Poland in an attempt to start a new life. However this attempt fails and Solek (Marco Hofschneider) and his brother Isak barely escape with their lives as their parents are forced into the Ghetto. 

 The succession of events that unfold from here are incredibly lucky and implausible to the point of being farcical, as they continuously push Solek towards survival as others around him fall victim to the horrors of the war. Becoming separated from his brother during the initial escape, Solek finds himself in a soviet orphanage and then in the hands of a group of German soldiers, who treat him as a war hero after he masquerades as a pure-bred German by the name of ‘Josef Peters’. His ability to change personas, to change his intrinsic identity even, is masterful and he manages to fool and charm everyone he comes into contact with. His youthful beauty also plays a part as he attracts both unwelcome and welcome attention from a gay Nazi officer and a sweet-faced but fascist girl whom he meets after he is recruited into the Hitler Youth programme.

  Europa Europa is essentially a film about identity and how easy it can be for one to change and hide his identity. Playing a character it seems, as a German officer points out, is sometimes ‘easier than being yourself.’ And in this case, if pretending to be German instead of Jewish can save Solek from persecution and ultimately death, it is certainly the easier option to pretend to be someone else. The fact that Solek is circumcised becomes a major plot point and provides many moments of tension as it is the only physical proof of his race and a symbol of his true identity that he is attempting to smother. In a moment of supreme irony, Solek is held up by a teacher at his Hitler youth academy as the pinnacle of Aryan perfection, a moment which exposes the illogicality in believing you can truly recognise a Jew from a German. 

 There are moments in the film where Solek appears to be losing his own identity in the process and the consequenting confusion this creates seems to gnaw away at him from the inside out. There is a moment where he sits at a window and sadly draws a Star of David in the condensation only to rub it out in a panic when he thinks someone might be coming. His Jewish identity never fails to be of huge importance and here it is being stifled along with the very essence of who he is, because to reveal it would be a crime.  The ending of this film is one sadly seldom seen in holocaust films, as Solek is reunited with his brother who has just been liberated from a concentration camp, in another very happy coincidence that seems to arrive just at the right time. Solek tells the audience that he will never hide who he truly is ever again and this vow is realise at the very end as the credits roll to an elderly Solek (played by the real Solomon Perel)  singing a traditional Hebrew song then walking off into what is hopefully a happier more tolerant world. 

 Apart from identity, the film is also primarily about survival and it is rightly so that Perel be heldup as a survival of the most miraculous levels and one that certainly paints him as a master of the double life. However, when watching the film I was left to wander uneasily about the possibility of redemption in a story about someone who so fervently denies who they are and what their family has been for generations. A scene that is most affecting is one in which Solek, as a member of the Hitler youth, rides a tram through the ghetto in which his parents are living in poverty and sees his mother. He cannot cry out to her because the tram windows are sealed shut, a physical reminder of how far he is slipping away from his family and the distance between them, created only by the Nazi uniform he wears and the Star of David that they are wearing. This scene is a prominent one in a film about the confusion and guilt of surviving when you shouldn’t have done and looking out from comfort and safety when you could just as easily have been on the other side, and by all rights should be.