also known as Quién mató a Walter Benjamin...
Who Killed Walter Benjamin?2005
What makes this film worth watching?
"With persistence Mauas seizes new relevant details from witnesses of that time which until now has been ignored by the international Benjamin research." - Bettina Bremme, Die Tageszeitung
2 members like this review
The film largely assumes that viewers already know of Benjamin's importance as a thinker but does not establish the significance he holds in 20th century thought. Hence, the viewers do not get a sense of the potential wasted with his demise. However, the investigation reveals inconsistencies and irregularities in all the documents and accounts that relate to Benjamin's death and leaves the viewer with proliferating questions. It does not attempt to reconstruct what might have happened. Viewers are left with an image of a man possibly abandoned to his killers by those who were supposedly closest to him. Very disturbing.
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Member Reviews (3)
The film largely assumes that viewers already know of Benjamin's importance as a thinker but does not establish the significance he holds in 20th century thought. Hence, the viewers do not get a sense of the potential wasted with his demise. However, the investigation reveals inconsistencies and irregularities in all the documents and accounts that relate to Benjamin's death and leaves the viewer with proliferating questions. It does not attempt to reconstruct what might have happened. Viewers are left with an image of a man possibly abandoned to his killers by those who were supposedly closest to him. Very disturbing.
While this movie presents a very compelling case for not accepting the death of Walter Benjamin as a suicide ( ie. the official version of events),
it really fails to give most viewers any reason to care.
This film would have been far more effective if the profound nature of Benjamin's intellectual reach had been been more thoroughly examined.
In the vast tragedy of World War II the death of even just one person can be made to seem relevant if the story is told with sufficient pathos.
If he had lived, Walter Benjamin could well have grown into one of the 2oth century's most influential thinkers but no sense of the enormity of the loss that resulted from his early death is considered here.
Excellent and disturbing detective documentary. It brings up questions of "Why are official historians so quick to accept so-called established accounts of historical events when it is well known that history is written for the winners or dominant authority in a specific society? I sincerely wish there are intelligent and inquisitive historians that will stop being lazy and complacent and will make every effort to search for the truth on any subject.