'John Rabe' gives a German view of the Battle of Nanking

As part of the unequal treaties and the 100 years of shame endured by China, European companies came into China and exploited the resources--human and otherwise. One of those companies was Siemens AG under the leadership of John Rabe. Rabe's diaries recorded the atrocities of Nanking and this 2009 German-Chinese-French production, "John Rabe,"  is based on those diaries, reportedly rediscovered by the late Iris Chang.

The Hamburg, Germany born Rabe entered China in 1908, working for Siemens AG China Corporation in various locations including Peking, Shanghai and finally Nanking. Siemens was founded as Siemens & Halske in 1847 based on a telegraph that didn't need to use Morse code. By 1919, S & H had entered into the production of light bulbs and in the 1920 and 1930s, as Adolf Hitler was rising to power, Siemens was making radios, TV sets and microscopes. The company supported the Nazi Party and eventually built factories in and near the Nazi death camps. Prisoners at the infamous Auschwitz worked at a Siemens factory inside the camp. Camp factories were often run by the SS.

The movie doesn't go into the history of Siemens and the Nazi party, but the allegiance of the company is clear from the Nazi flag it flies.

The movie begins with a phonograph playing European music. We meet John Rabe (Ulrich Tukur) and he speaks in German to his female Chinese telephone operators. The movie cuts between scenes that look like archival footage and richly colored scenes of the foreigners and their life of luxury. News of the Japanese invasion begins in 27 November 1937 when Rabe writes about it with optimism. In a voiceover, Rabe explains, "They say the Japanese razed Shanghai to the ground. I just don't want to believe that." In Nanking, all is quiet although some people are running away in anticipation of the Japanese invasion.

Rabe isn't a particularly likable person.  He's been reassigned and is leaving Nanking. As he attempts to move his prized piano, he finds the Chinese workers aren't very helpful, speaking in German, he declares, "these idiots are good for nothing." He has the same opinion of his driver Chang, exclaiming "How can anybody be so dumb?"

Before the invasion, he wasn't against the Japanese invasion, writing "it wouldn't be bad if Japan gained more influence in China" because the Japanese are allies of the Nazi regime. And China isn't his concern any more as John Rabe is getting ready to leave China after 27 years and 142 days. At an elegant ball in his honor, all of Nanking's high society attend. A woman sings a Western sounding ballad about waiting for someone to return. The crowd is mostly non-East Asian.

Not all of the foreigners in Nanking are allies of Germany. American doctor Robert O. Wilson (Steve Buscemi) snidely remarks at Rabe's going away party about a Nazi being honored by a less than honorable Chinese official, "A corrupt Chinese general honors a Nazi." Yet this is balanced by the other foreign guests complaining about almost everything from the way the Chinese serve wine to the Japanese ambassador Fukuda (Togo Igawa) explaining how China should not see Japan as an enemy, "but as an opportunity." After all, "the clever must lead the simple-minded."  Sounds like the White Man's Burden has mutated in Japan.

The party clearly shows the separation of the privileged foreigners from the normal native Chinese population and even their distain for the Chinese whose hospitality they exploit. Yet things are going to change because this is late in the year 1937. After the Chinese official intones, "All Chinese must be sad today" because John Rabe "has done more for China than one could have expected from a foreigner," Rabe gets up to address all the guests, but he never gets a chance to finish his speech.

The Japanese are entering Nanking with bombs and even the foreigners aren't sheltered from the bombs. When Rabe and others including Wilson (a real person) form the International Safety Zone Committee, the American Minnie Vautrin is replaced by a fictional French woman named Valerie Dupres (Anne Consigny). The "safety zone" isn't entirely safe.

Rabe is forced to act and throughout Rabe finds his decisions questioned--not only by a more staunchly Nazi German, but also by other Germans such as Dr. Rosen (Daniel Bruhl) who have felt the dark shadows of the European Holocaust. Rabe might be the "good German" but he wasn't saintly. Likewise, the Chinese and the Japanese aren't all saints against the sinners.

The film was controversial in Japan because the Prince Yasuhiko Asaka (Teruyuki Kagawa), who was commander of the Japanese forces in China, is shown as having a decisive role in the Nanking Massacre. The film did not receive a theatrical release in Japan. While that might be a political problem with the film, the other is point of view. The movie is from a Rabe's point of view, a foreigner's viewpoint of Chinese history without a counterbalance of, say, the chauffeur's experience (Ming Li) or that off a Chinese doctor. Too often, expositions substitute for visual character development, but even this isn't too tiresome as the movie attempts to show the enormity of the Nanking Massacre.

The movie, which was nominated for seven German Film Awards, won for Best Film, Best Actor, Best Production Design and Best Costume Design. In German, Chinese, Japanese and English with English subtitles, the movie is available on Netflix for streaming.