While the Maastricht Treaty has addressed the economic integration of member states in the EU with its free trade policies, its goal of minimizing economic inequalities, and thereby social inequality, has not been achieved. While the Treaty promotes strong policies that should, theoretically, keep unemployment constant throughout its borders such as freedom of movement for jobs and vocational training, countries in Southern Europe, such as Italy and Greece, as well as Spain, Portugal, and Ireland in Western Europe have high levels of unemployment, especially for their youth.
There are certainly many factors that play into this lack of economic equality, but in “Code Unknown”, Haneke suggests that the EU’s principles of open borders is merely a nice concept rather than the reality for those in poor socio-economic conditions. Indeed, throughout the film, we are confronted by Maria, a woman from Romania who is forced often to leave Romania to find jobs to provide for her family. Despite her desire to work hard, she is deported even though she is the victim when Jean, a young snarky French boy, is the one who abuses her. We see that economic prosperity of other European countries has not yet reached her hometown, particularly because when this film was made in 2001, Romania had not entered the EU. As such, Maria is socially looked down upon by those in wealthier areas, and I believe that it is still likely that this stereotype of poor women who come to wealthier EU countries to beg has not yet been eliminated, despite Romania’s entrance into the EU. In the Ventotene Manifesto, I believe that Spinelli and Rossi were right in that economic integration doesn’t necessarily cause the poor to become better off as they become enslaved to the institutions for which they work, or in Maria’s case, hope to work for.
As such, this film is quite the contrast to “L’Auberge Espagnole” due to its negative view of the EU’s policies bringing individuals closer together. As Ha mentioned, it is likely because the Maastricht treaty largely intended to integrate those in research, specifically those affiliated within the university system who also came from wealthier backgrounds. “Code Unknown,” however, confronts the intersection of those that are not part of the education system, and as such, we see a much larger unwillingness of characters to look past the stereotypes of other cultures. These characters don’t often interact, but when they do, there is tension, violence, and a general unwillingness to approach one another. Even though four of the main characters, Maria, George, Anne, and Amadou live in France and face the same the economic environment, they are still stratified by their social classes and ethnicities which the Maastricht Treaty has failed to solve.
I am in complete agreement with this post. Much of what the EU stands for is somewhat superficial and unobtainable with the current system. While its goals are to create a fairly equal economic prosperity for every individual within the system, this goal is simply ludicrous.
After reading the Maastricht Treaty (the doctrine that established the EU) and analyzing today’s current situation in Europe, it is easy to see many of the goals it outlines have not been achieved. One of their main objectives was to create a level playing field for all members within the European economic sphere. However, as clearly shown in today’s global economy, many of the members of the EU suffer, while their counterparts are forced to also bare some of their struggles and pull them along. Countries such as Greece have shrinking economies that cripple the value of the Euro, while successful countries such as Germany have to support them.
Unemployment is also a massive problem in Europe. With the implementation of free travel between members of the EU, immigration is prevalent in many countries of Europe. Once immigrants are there, they travel relatively freely from one nation to another. This was not taken into account within the Maastricht Treaty. Thus, unemployment has been a large issue for many European nations, especially Greece, Spain and Italy.
In my opinion, this treaty has many great intentions. However, it does not accomplish them effectively. The EU seems to be falling apart with Brexit and widespread hardships. Those in the EU need to reevaluate many of their decisions made in the early 90’s.
The European Union is stuck. Far from a federation, yet integrated well beyond fully independent and sovereign states, the EU resides in a complicated middle ground. While the theory of a fully unified and federalized Europe has existed for hundreds of years including famously penned during the enlightenment by Jean-Jackques Rousseau, 21st century EU bound Europe is still not a Federation. Rousseau’s writing is still extremely relevant because Europeans and the EU member states struggle deeply with sacrificing sovereignty for the ideals of lasting peace and economic prosperity. Recent sparks in issues including immigration, rising nationalism, inter-EU inequality, and the role of the European government pose new and potent threats to the ideals Rousseau hypothesized.
The film Code Unknown: An Incomplete Account of Various Journeys by Michael Haneke depicts some of the issues present in Europe. The film shows four different characters who all face personal issues that broadly trouble Europe as well. One character, Amadou, was born to African immigrant parents and in the opening scene is clearly stereotyped for his race and brought to the police office. The character Maria is a Romanian who has come to France and spends her time begging for money. She admits begging is humiliating but sees no path forward in Romania and thus does not have a choice but to try to seek fortune in Western Europe. Native Frenchmen Jean is a teenager who has come to the city to flee his parents farming business. These three examples show three crucial issues: racial strife in Europe, wealth disparity between Western and Eastern Europe, and the divide between the wealthy cities and rural farm country.
The EU is complicated for many reasons as described, yet another complication is how free trade within the EU and trade deals negotiated with countries outside the EU have hurt local farmers. Cheese in an example in Italy of a once booming agricultural industry that has been hurt by EU policy. While the EU stands opposed to protective tariffs like those currently being threatened and used by the Trump administration, the EU must understand the risks certain policies pose to its citizens and its long-term sustainability. Italians are one of many groups that have begun to vote in earnest for Euro-skeptic parties staunchly opposed to further EU integration. Brexit aside, rising anti-Euro sentiment is threatening to deal a blow to the European Parliamentary government during the upcoming 2019 European elections. Much of the dispute in Europe is in regard to what the EU should and should not control and what should be left to its sovereign members.
Rousseau’s 18th century proposal for a Federation of European States rings more relevant than ever as Europe sits dangerously perched between full and zero real integration. A Federation of Europe would solve many of these bureaucratic problems, but could the 21st century member states really agree sacrifice total sovereignty to unify as one? Perhaps Rousseau’s vision was more idealistic than practical, but it is crucially important to explore when studying the history of the European integration project and analyzing where the project stands today.
The the gradual disappearance of the word “peoples” and its replacement with the more salient term “Member States” in the Maastricht treaty provide a powerful demonstration of the conflicts underlying European integration when it comes to prioritizing the state and prioritizing the individuals that make up them.
While reading through the opening of the Maastricht Treaty, I found myself immediately noticing how often the term “peoples” were used: it appeared in four out of the eleven goals and reasons stated for establishing the EU in the first two pages. It then appeared again in Article A, in the very first description of the Treaty, which reads, “This Treaty marks a new stage in the process of creating an ever-closer union among the peoples of Europe…”—not a union among the states, but instead, among the “peoples.”
Yet, for such a present word in the opening of the document, “peoples” virtually disappeared in the rest of the Maastricht Treaty, and any reference to unity and cooperation were made in reference to the “Member States” instead. To me, this disappearance demonstrates a fading out of the individual when European integration is considered and implemented on a macro scale. These individuals are those represented in Code Unknown, the people who make up another Europe that exist entirely outside of the Europe for the middle-class students we saw last week and the politicians in conference rooms, the writers of the Treaty, and the state-leaders that continue to implement terms of the Treaty to this day. When it comes the defining the extent of the European Union and of European integration as a whole, this linguistic pattern in the Maastricht Treaty and the characters and events that unfolded in Code Unknown demonstrate that the “Other,” which simultaneously gets defined when establishing “Europe,” are not just those who exist outside of Europe in Asia, Africa, or the Middle East; instead, they exist within Europe itself. Code Unknown features the individuals and the events that are frequently passed by, on the streets as well as in political documents. Their collisions—just as much a result and a driving force behind the success or failure of integration—are the ones unseen, especially in the bigger picture of economic development, globalization, and political union.
With the rising tone of nationalism that plagues politics today, stemming from the “peoples” who have gradually disappeared in the pages of the Maastricht Treaty and consumed within the umbrella of “Member States,” what does this means for the states themselves, which, as the Maastricht Treaty has made clear in its remaining pages beyond the opening, are the entities whom the goals and measures of integration actually rest on?
Since the late 1700’s the argument for the benefits of a European Union has been made, and the predictions of its necessity and advancements are very accurate to what we see today. However, it took until the formation of totalitarian states and almost domination of Europe for the Union to be developed.
In the writing of Jean-Jacques Rousseau he talks about the underlaying similarities that the different nations of Europe share, but that without a political union, they will consistently break truces and treaties when underlaying age old divides come back to light. The powers in Europe all want to protect and expand their own lands, and the result of this is constant aggression, and a mess of allies and treaties. However, no matter the number of wars, the general appearance of Europe has remained the same, no one nation has been powerful enough to overcome the alliance of the other countries, and even when an aggressive coalition of countries is formed, there is enough dissent in their union to allow the other countries to unite and defeat them. This was true until the formation of totalitarian states as stated in the Ventotene Manifesto which states “the State has been turned into a master of vassals bound into servitude, and has all the powers it needs to achieve the maximum war-efficiency.” This switch along with the advancement of technologies finally allowed a European coalition to conquer all continental Europe and it was only defeated by the involvement of forces outside of the continent. This directed the states of Europe to finally accept the idea of a union that would end the necessity for war, as well as bringing about many of the positives stated in Rousseau’s work; “Think of the waste of men, of money, of strength in every form; think of the exhaustion in which any State is plunged by the most successful war; compare these ravages with the profit which results: and we shall find that we commonly lose where we suppose ourselves to gain; that the conqueror, always enfeebled by the war, can only console himself with the thought that the conquered is still more enfeebled than himself. And even this advantage is more in appearance than reality; for the strength which has been gained upon our opponent has been lost against the neutrals who, without changing themselves, are nevertheless stronger relatively to us by all the strength that we have lost.”. This point by Rousseau is one of many that point to the total positives for all nations to unite and end the need for war. And although they still must protect from attacks from the outside, the threat of fighting a unified Europe will deter almost all invaders. And with the threats from both inside and outside gone, resources can be focused on betterment of the people. These benefits can be seen today in the European Union, and although it certainly isn’t perfect, many of Rousseau’s predictions were correct.
The European Union was created on a foundation that emphasizes unity. The main focus of the European Union was to bring together the people of a select few nations of the European continent (although the definition of what is the European continent is ambiguous). The key word is “select.” Not all nations that are considered or debated to be in the boundaries of Europe were first included in the original founding of the Union. Some of these nations are still not included in the Union. And for such reasons, nationalism has been a dangerous member of the European Union, causing more division than anything else. Because of this divide, I think that there has been a rising struggle of the “global” vs. the “local.”
The European Union, in this case, would be considered the “local.”. It is local in that its main focuses are on a select few nations, with a select population in mind, and it is also local is the egotistical/nationalistic way. This “local” mindset that has been instilled by the Union causes the sentiment of The Other, where all other groups that do not fall into the select few chosen by the Union are excluded and considered outsiders. This is where the idea of the “global” comes into play. The rest of the world outside of the Union would fall into the “global” category in that it is everything and everyone that the European Union has decided to not include in the community being built. Michael Haneke’s 2000 film Code Unknown shows this exact struggle between the global and the local, and the exclusion of “The Other” that is produced by the European Union.
Code Unknown represents the part of Europe that is excluded from the “local” limits of the Union. The characters from the movie are the people that are often marginalized in European society. One of the best examples is Maria, the woman from Romania, who is subject to poverty and is ultimately deported from France for just being at the wrong place at the wrong time, without even causing any trouble. At the time the movie was released (2000), Romania was still seven years away from being considered a part of the European Union. Romania was considered an outsider, representing countries of Eastern Europe that were considered too impoverished to be a part of the Union, and were often looked down upon as inferior to the Union countries. This also hints to the rising sentiments of nationalism in Europe in that countries feel superior to other countries, which is also portrayed in the movie with the scene of Jean throwing his trash on Maria. The fact the she is sitting and he is standing suggests dominance of the French over the Romanians.
These sentiments are reflected throughout Maastricht Treaty. There is a tension present between the inside and the outside, or the global and the local. Article F of the Maastricht Treat states, “The Union shall respect the national identities of its Member States.” This statement is true is the sense of how myopic it has proven to be, where Members of the European Union have difficulty in seeing beyond their own local scope within the Union. Members respect their own national identities most, have little respect to the identities of other Member States, and often tend to ignore the rest that do not fall into the select few included in these boundaries. The European States have a fear of recognizing the global, and tend to stay within the local boundaries. But Code Unknown proves that the local cannot hide from the global because the global will always be present.
However, France and Germany do have the positive benefits of being countries that are seen as financially stable and politically similar. To reference “Code Unknown,” there doesn’t seem to be a huge push for either of these Western, wealthier European countries to make efforts to more closely align themselves with some Eastern European countries, such as Romania, despite their integration into the EU for over 12 years. Going forward, I believe that, as “Code Unknown” comes to suggest, the uniting local forces ultimately won’t be enough to counter the rising push of global factors without proper discussion of how differing cultures can view themselves as one population.
Sorry, this is the full post of the previous comment which was cut off
I think that Daniela brings up an interesting point in there being a division between local (a select few countries within the European Union) and other global forces. I would like to suggest however, that as many local forces within the EU are being torn apart with the rise of nationalism within countries, such as the UK, this is not exclusively the case for France and Germany. This is because these two countries have just taken new steps towards being seen as 1, not just in their part as members of the EU, but also in their efforts in other international organizations such as the UN. I believe that, again as Daniela mentioned, this is in part fueled by nationalism, but instead of it being a driving force away from France and Germany and the EU, the political parties in charge of these two countries are trying to unite these two nations to counter the threat of nationalism.
However, France and Germany do have the positive benefits of being countries that are seen as financially stable and politically similar. To reference “Code Unknown,” there doesn’t seem to be a huge push for either of these Western, wealthier European countries to make efforts to more closely align themselves with some Eastern European countries, such as Romania, despite their integration into the EU for over 7 years. Going forward, I believe that, as “Code Unknown” comes to suggest, that the uniting local forces ultimately won’t be enough to counter the rising push of global factors without proper discussion of how differing cultures can view themselves as one population.
The film Code Inconnu presents themes of both connection alongside deep isolation between people, highlighting the the European union as a means to a somewhat unsuccessful end. Characters within the film tend to have a large – and often negative – impact on one another, as seen through such events as Maria’s sudden deportation resulting from Jean’s immaturity and disrespect. This ripple-effect of connection is contrasted with the even more prominent notion of isolation of understanding. This is first observed in the film’s subtitle, “The incomplete tales of several journeys”, which introduces the idea of a full dialogue not being communicated: that full stories will not be shared or understood. The first scene presents and compounds this idea with the image of a small girl acting out a mime of fear and isolation, and receiving no understanding from her peers in response. Further in the film, while Anne and her approximately middle-class white social group is sharing lunch, serious topics such as Georges’ experience in the war front and the news of a friend’s family being split apart by divorce are cut off in favor of more trivial matters. All these instance of poor communication via spoken language and body language relate to the idea that Europe as a union does not in fact automatically create a space where positive connections and understanding between citizens will exist.
Clearly, the prevention of interpersonal conflicts is not in the ballpark of the aims of such works as the Maastricht Treaty. However, such conflict and degradation of relations indicates through symbolism the imperfection of the EU as a way to unify nations. It highlights instead its imbalanced effect on different portions of the population, such as farmers versus urban dwellers, citizens of the EU versus non-citizens, minorities versus non-minorities, etc. Part of this limitation may stem from a statement within the Maastricht Treaty which reads, “…action by the Community shall not go beyond what is necessary to achieve the objectives of the treaty”. Therefore, as many of the Treaty’s objectives were perhaps a little vague or generalized, or up to the member states to organize, then comprehensive action to fix these issues may not ever occur. In other words, the Treaty acts as an incomplete measure to address all the issues put forth in the film; though there are aspects of the Treaty which have indeed been realized such as uniform currency and ease of transport between borders, for now.
I agree that Code Unknown is indeed a story about communication, or lack thereof. Most of the stories revolved around someone not understanding something, like Jean’s father not understanding his desires, Anne not understanding her situation in the room, the police not understanding Amadou, or Maria feeling out of place in France. The nonlinear, confusing segments being meshed together further added to this feeling of uncertainty and discomfort. What stood out to me the most were the long takes. I believe that every segment was one take, regardless of length. I think that this ultimately served to give the film a more intimate feeling. As a viewer, the film felt more like I was present in the situation, witnessing even the mundane activities, rather than watching something that was heavily edited.
The climax of the film was arguably the second scene that brought all of the characters together, representing the coming together of France, Africa, and Romania. The scene made me think of the Ventotene Manifesto, as one of the key points of the piece was arguing for “[preserving] a sense of human dignity.” The Manifesto spoke heavily on giving equal opportunity and freedoms to all, regardless of socioeconomic background. Amadou clearly has principles that parallel this ideology, as he was willing to even go to jail in order to defend Maria from disrespect. But I also wondered if his actions were necessary. Did he need to draw so much attention towards Maria, even when it was clear she did not want it? His intervention certainly seemed to be costly at the end as it caused her to be deported. I think that this brings up more questions regarding the role of countries in playing the role of caretaker for others, and if this in itself is dehumanizing or unwarranted.
Europe, as a whole, has usually had a similar culture across national boundaries. Thus, the argument for the formation of a European Union has been discussed since the 17th century. That being said, the hunger for power of monarchs and leaders stretching back centuries often prevented that from ever happening until the late 20th century.
In the meantime, wars and conflicts persisted across Europe, most notably World War I and World War II. Many proposed solutions to prevent such wars from ever occurring again. One of these said solutions was cited in the Ventone Manifesto. This piece, written by Altiero Spinelli and by Ernesto Rossi, proposed a system of European Federalism, as well as World Federalism. In their opinion, this was the solution to all the gruesome wars that had taken place throughout European History.
Within their argument, the two highlight the possible outcomes of pushing for a European Union. The most important piece of text within their writing is as follows: “The dividing line between progressive and reactionary parties no longer follows the formal line of greater or lesser democracy, or of more or less socialism to be instituted; rather the division falls along the line, very new and substantial, that separates the party members into two groups. The first is made up of those who conceive the essential purpose and goal of struggle as the ancient one, that is, the conquest of national political power – and who, although involuntarily, play into the hands of reactionary forces, letting the incandescent lava of popular passions set in the old moulds, and thus allowing old absurdities to arise once again. The second are those who see the creation of a solid international State as the main purpose; they will direct popular forces toward this goal, and, having won national power, will use it first and foremost as an instrument for achieving international unity.”
Spinelli and Rossi recognize their flaws and possible outcomes of pushing for a federal system in Europe. They see the two possible factions that may form, but point out why those with the goal to unite Europe will be triumphant.
My reaction to this piece is fairly simple. These men were wishful thinkers. While we did eventually something similar in the EU, Europe is again facing waves of rising nationalism and problems within the EU. One can predict all outcome, but it is impossible to predict the human behavior that can come out of uniting within a nation and thinking it would be better off without the baggage of other nations holding them back. I am left asking many questions. How would these men react to Brexit? What will risis of Nationalism in individual countries do to a federation?
This is an incredibly meandering, disconnected movie. Disconnected in the sense that it follows a few seemingly unrelated individuals apart from a brief interaction at the beginning of the film. Meandering in that chronology seems either unclear or even reversed. Many early scenes in the movie do not make sense until the viewer has seen later scenes. For instance, I thought Anne had died in the scene where she was locked in a room and told she would die by some psychopathic sounding individual only to see her in a later scene and realize she had merely been auditioning. This film took a while to properly grasp in ways like that. There was a perplexing scene where Georges sat on a subway with his camera. It felt like he was just sitting there awkwardly looking about as one might do on a subway, but in a later scene we see photos of countless people, apparently all on subways while someone (I assume Georges) talks about being in Kabul. It seems that Georges wears his camera around his neck on subways to take pictures of random faces. I can’t fathom why, but there’s that. I can’t figure what the directors aim with all this disjointedness is.
Nearly every scene in this movie bothered me in some way or another. I despised the scene where Amadou is on a date with some girl. It just felt so wrong to see him tell her he didn’t like her watch and for her to just throw it away right there. Then the way the girl on the date kept seemingly touching her wrist where her watch had rested moments before as if looking for its comfort and finding nothing in its place. Then there is the scene where Anne is ironing clothes and hears what sounds like horrific screaming and crying from her neighbor’s place, but she does not do anything and merely turns down the volume of the TV to hear it more clearly. Eventually the screaming dies down and Anne goes back to ironing and sipping wine.
I think the strangest piece of this film was not actually the general queasiness or badness of just about every scene, but the way in which the scenes are shot. It is incredibly minimalist. There aren’t really any edits to the scenes. Sometimes the camera moves around as the characters move. Sometimes the screen goes black for a brief moment and then skips to a new scene. That is about all that happens. The scenes themselves are usually incredibly mundane in what the characters are actually doing, though dripping in intensity at points, such as on the subway when Anne is harassed by some rowdy Arab boys. I do wonder why we are so often given such incredibly mundane, yet emotional scenes in this film. It feels very different from what I have seen previously in Hollywood.
Rousseau’s idealistic and Haneke’s pessimistic view on the unity and integration of society illustrates the complications of the European Union effectively.
On the one hand, Rousseau’s dream of a European federation paints a glorified picture filled with the benefits for the nations and the people. The federation should create lasting peace in Europe, ensure beneficial economic trade of labor and goods between the integrated nations, and contribute to the wellbeing of the people. These ideas have been partially fulfilled and can be credited by the European Union to some extent. Europe has been relatively peaceful following World War II, and particularly Western Europe has enjoyed free trade and a booming economy in these calmer years.
On the other hand, Rousseau fails to recognize the social context of creating a European federation, which is illustrated by Haneke in Code Unknown. Haneke portrays the persisting socioeconomic and racial tension in France, particularly through the second scene of the film. The viewer sees Jean, a young Frenchman who recently left his dad, throwing half-eaten food at a homeless Romanian woman. Amadou, a second-generation African immigrant, intervenes and demands that Jean apologizes to the woman. The whole scene ends in a fight between the two men, who are arrested by the police. Yet, the gravest consequence falls upon the Romanian, who is deported.
A second scene that further underlines complexities of immigration and society in France is the subway confrontation between Anne Laurent, and aspiring actress, and two Arab teenagers. The teenagers harass Anne Laurent, referring to her as a person from the elite portion of the society who will only ignore the rest. This explicitly addresses the tension Haneke emphasizes throughout the film and serves as the embodiment of how an integrated Europe still poses numerous societal issues.
Thus, the combination of Rousseau and Haneke portray the complex relationship between the nations of the European Union, including benefits such as lasting peace and free trade, and drawbacks such as the challenging integration of immigrants and social tension.
While watching this movie one of the only things that ran through my mind was “the ‘other’ Europe.” The Europe that is not publicized or talked about until you are in a class studying what Europe is, or like me another class that focuses specifically on racism and exclusivity in Europe. From the little changes in lighting and scene structure to the storyline that is shared on the screen, Code Unknown is a very different film than the one we saw last week, L’auberge Espagnole.
The lighting and camera angles, and how they are used, are vastly different than from last week. To start, the lighting is dark and dim, making the picture presented on the screen harder to see. One of the opening scenes was in the crowded streets of Paris, but it was rather dark like it was an overcast day, rather than the bright Barcelona shots that we got in L’auberge Espagnole. Another scene that comes to mind is when Maria makes it home and is meeting her husband for the first time since arriving, the air around them is filled with dust from the truck that passed beforehand, emphasizing the struggles of her home country. The scenes were also not pieced together like they were in the film from last week, from scene to scene it was not a continuous storyline, but a mix of them that all come together in a strange way. It was like watching three or four different movies that had been edited together to form one.
The representation of Europe is also very different than the one from last week; Code Unknown does not show different countries coming together for “the greater good” like the roommates in L’auberge Espagnole did while saving Wendy from the awkward meeting of her lover and her boyfriend. Instead, Code Unknown focuses on what happens to the working class population, immigrants, and Muslims living in Europe, and by that I mean the white, Christian Europe. Code Unknown shows the story of the father and son duo that have a farm and their own personal struggles with that fact- the father struggling with running and maintaining it while the son wants no involvement in it at all. It shows Maria in cuffs getting on a plane as she is deported back to her home country. It follows the Muslim family and their struggle of being both black and Muslim, opening their storyline with the eldest son, Amadou, being mistreated by police officers and taken in for questioning while Jean was not.
In short, this movie takes on a completely different perspective then the one that we witnessed last week. This movie focuses on the realistic side of Europe rather than on the idea of what and how Europe should be. Choosing to focus on the commoners, those who are most affected by the idea of a common Europe presents a storyline that can be understood by many, through the representation of reality for different groups in Europe.
Code Unknown initially struck me as incredibly different than L’auberge Espagnole – specifically from a cinematographic standpoint – in comparison to L’auberge Espagnole, Code Unknown had a much less linear and more convoluted plot with no clear resolution – in fact it’s hard to see what a resolution would even look like as Code Unknown is more of a collection of scenes loosely tied a central event than a specific, chronologically defined story. But if you look at the ideas that both films are trying to convey, this makes sense. As I wrote in my previous blog post, L’auberge Espagnole has a clear “Europtimist” tint to it: “Klapisch Klapisch shows that it is possible for people to forgo their national identity in favor of a broader, general “European” identity which in my opinion is the crux of his Europtimism.”
On the other hand, Code Unknown paints a bleaker picture, presenting the social difficulties that exist within the European Union today, specifically the difficulties that have come about with immigration, especially between geographic areas with such different cultures. This is a common theme in Code Unknown, and one could argue that Haneke is providing an artistic counterargument to Klapisch in the sense that it will be very difficult for people to forgo their national and/or cultural identity in favor of a broader, more general “European” identity (given that L’auberge Espagnole is centered around the experiences of middle class, highly educated students whereas Code Unknown involves characters from different socioeconomic backgrounds, in my opinion it paints a much more realistic picture).
For example, there are multiple instances in the film where we see instances of racism, specifically towards the Malian family. When Amadou confronts Jean for throwing trash on a Romanian homeless women, something that most viewers will agree is admirable (although there is definitely room for discussion about the method he used to do so) he is taken to police headquarters and his family’s apartment is unreasonably ransacked by police in order to look for some shred of evidence to try to detain him for something. On the other hand, white Jean is simply let go. Additionally, the Romanian homeless woman is deported to Romania despite doing nothing wrong. Given the modern day context of how Eastern Europeans tend to be looked down upon by Western Europeans, we can infer that this has something to do with her treatment.
These scenes demonstrate that many Europeans still have an “us vs. them” mentality regarding other Europeans of different cultures, despite the fact that they live on the same continent and are all Europeans at the end of the day.
The Ventotene Manifesto elucidates the harmful result of nationalism winning the battle between nationalism and Europeanism, demonstrating the importance of the balance between the two in order for harmony to exist in Western Europe. While some amount of nationalism is key for progress to occur in each nation, such as the “free movement of people and goods” that the Manifesto discusses, too much of it results simple in never ending violence.
Through details told slightly like a storybook, the Manifesto demonstrates the way that a war mentality degrades all aspects of life in these overly-nationalist nations before the EU came together. Because of the importance with which each country held itself, all countries felt threatened by others. Thus, all focuses were on war. Most powerfully, the Manifesto states that even during peacetime, there was in fact no focus on peace, on connection, or on harmony between these nations. Rather, the time was spent preparing for the next war that they knew would soon come. In this way, there was never a true feeling of concord, but rather an obsession with violence that seeped into every part of life, including schooling for young children, science studies, the government, and more.
The Manifesto successfully works as a tool of propaganda in support of the EU in a similar way as L’auberge Espagnole. While the Manifesto focuses more on the difficulties of the of the states while they are separate and L’auberge Espagnole focuses on the harmony that can come between the joining of these states, both work to create this idea that alone, no country is complete, but together, all of these countries in the union will be whole.
Here is my second blog of the week to make up for joining the class late:
My main criticism of Code Unknown is Haneke’s unintended effect of describing every human interaction as negative.
As discussed in class, Haneke illustrated a pessimistic view of society, rooted in all the conversations and actions between the characters of the movie. This is exemplified throughout the film, including the scene where Jean disrespects Maria and Amadou intervenes resulting in two arrests and a deportation, the scene where Amadou’s father has to cut his workday short as a taxi driver resulting in a clear act of distaste by the passenger, and the scene where the young Arabs harass Anne Laurent.
Furthermore, all the main relationships in the movie are portrayed as rough and complicated at best. Jean leaves his father, Anne Laurent constantly fights with her boyfriend, and Amadou’s family is in constant distress and worry. On top of that, the only significant scene that shows a happy family life turns out to be a part of a movie where Anne Laurent has a lead role. Haneke therefore implies that a joyful life is elusive and idealistic, in contrast to the true interactions and relationships of Code Unknown.
However, this dark illustration of society by Haneke is a risky one, particularly in combination with other important themes of the film, such as immigration, fragmentation, and social tension. The viewer may therefore interpret Code Unknown as a film that advocates against immigration, and thus can be misused by far-right groups for this purpose. Even though Haneke did not intend for this interpretation to occur, it is one he should have anticipated. Thus, although Haneke addresses several important issues in today’s Europe, he should have altered the film to clearly reflect that it is not a propaganda tool for anti-immigration.
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While the Maastricht Treaty has addressed the economic integration of member states in the EU with its free trade policies, its goal of minimizing economic inequalities, and thereby social inequality, has not been achieved. While the Treaty promotes strong policies that should, theoretically, keep unemployment constant throughout its borders such as freedom of movement for jobs and vocational training, countries in Southern Europe, such as Italy and Greece, as well as Spain, Portugal, and Ireland in Western Europe have high levels of unemployment, especially for their youth.
There are certainly many factors that play into this lack of economic equality, but in “Code Unknown”, Haneke suggests that the EU’s principles of open borders is merely a nice concept rather than the reality for those in poor socio-economic conditions. Indeed, throughout the film, we are confronted by Maria, a woman from Romania who is forced often to leave Romania to find jobs to provide for her family. Despite her desire to work hard, she is deported even though she is the victim when Jean, a young snarky French boy, is the one who abuses her. We see that economic prosperity of other European countries has not yet reached her hometown, particularly because when this film was made in 2001, Romania had not entered the EU. As such, Maria is socially looked down upon by those in wealthier areas, and I believe that it is still likely that this stereotype of poor women who come to wealthier EU countries to beg has not yet been eliminated, despite Romania’s entrance into the EU. In the Ventotene Manifesto, I believe that Spinelli and Rossi were right in that economic integration doesn’t necessarily cause the poor to become better off as they become enslaved to the institutions for which they work, or in Maria’s case, hope to work for.
As such, this film is quite the contrast to “L’Auberge Espagnole” due to its negative view of the EU’s policies bringing individuals closer together. As Ha mentioned, it is likely because the Maastricht treaty largely intended to integrate those in research, specifically those affiliated within the university system who also came from wealthier backgrounds. “Code Unknown,” however, confronts the intersection of those that are not part of the education system, and as such, we see a much larger unwillingness of characters to look past the stereotypes of other cultures. These characters don’t often interact, but when they do, there is tension, violence, and a general unwillingness to approach one another. Even though four of the main characters, Maria, George, Anne, and Amadou live in France and face the same the economic environment, they are still stratified by their social classes and ethnicities which the Maastricht Treaty has failed to solve.
I am in complete agreement with this post. Much of what the EU stands for is somewhat superficial and unobtainable with the current system. While its goals are to create a fairly equal economic prosperity for every individual within the system, this goal is simply ludicrous.
After reading the Maastricht Treaty (the doctrine that established the EU) and analyzing today’s current situation in Europe, it is easy to see many of the goals it outlines have not been achieved. One of their main objectives was to create a level playing field for all members within the European economic sphere. However, as clearly shown in today’s global economy, many of the members of the EU suffer, while their counterparts are forced to also bare some of their struggles and pull them along. Countries such as Greece have shrinking economies that cripple the value of the Euro, while successful countries such as Germany have to support them.
Unemployment is also a massive problem in Europe. With the implementation of free travel between members of the EU, immigration is prevalent in many countries of Europe. Once immigrants are there, they travel relatively freely from one nation to another. This was not taken into account within the Maastricht Treaty. Thus, unemployment has been a large issue for many European nations, especially Greece, Spain and Italy.
In my opinion, this treaty has many great intentions. However, it does not accomplish them effectively. The EU seems to be falling apart with Brexit and widespread hardships. Those in the EU need to reevaluate many of their decisions made in the early 90’s.
The European Union is stuck. Far from a federation, yet integrated well beyond fully independent and sovereign states, the EU resides in a complicated middle ground. While the theory of a fully unified and federalized Europe has existed for hundreds of years including famously penned during the enlightenment by Jean-Jackques Rousseau, 21st century EU bound Europe is still not a Federation. Rousseau’s writing is still extremely relevant because Europeans and the EU member states struggle deeply with sacrificing sovereignty for the ideals of lasting peace and economic prosperity. Recent sparks in issues including immigration, rising nationalism, inter-EU inequality, and the role of the European government pose new and potent threats to the ideals Rousseau hypothesized.
The film Code Unknown: An Incomplete Account of Various Journeys by Michael Haneke depicts some of the issues present in Europe. The film shows four different characters who all face personal issues that broadly trouble Europe as well. One character, Amadou, was born to African immigrant parents and in the opening scene is clearly stereotyped for his race and brought to the police office. The character Maria is a Romanian who has come to France and spends her time begging for money. She admits begging is humiliating but sees no path forward in Romania and thus does not have a choice but to try to seek fortune in Western Europe. Native Frenchmen Jean is a teenager who has come to the city to flee his parents farming business. These three examples show three crucial issues: racial strife in Europe, wealth disparity between Western and Eastern Europe, and the divide between the wealthy cities and rural farm country.
The EU is complicated for many reasons as described, yet another complication is how free trade within the EU and trade deals negotiated with countries outside the EU have hurt local farmers. Cheese in an example in Italy of a once booming agricultural industry that has been hurt by EU policy. While the EU stands opposed to protective tariffs like those currently being threatened and used by the Trump administration, the EU must understand the risks certain policies pose to its citizens and its long-term sustainability. Italians are one of many groups that have begun to vote in earnest for Euro-skeptic parties staunchly opposed to further EU integration. Brexit aside, rising anti-Euro sentiment is threatening to deal a blow to the European Parliamentary government during the upcoming 2019 European elections. Much of the dispute in Europe is in regard to what the EU should and should not control and what should be left to its sovereign members.
Rousseau’s 18th century proposal for a Federation of European States rings more relevant than ever as Europe sits dangerously perched between full and zero real integration. A Federation of Europe would solve many of these bureaucratic problems, but could the 21st century member states really agree sacrifice total sovereignty to unify as one? Perhaps Rousseau’s vision was more idealistic than practical, but it is crucially important to explore when studying the history of the European integration project and analyzing where the project stands today.
The the gradual disappearance of the word “peoples” and its replacement with the more salient term “Member States” in the Maastricht treaty provide a powerful demonstration of the conflicts underlying European integration when it comes to prioritizing the state and prioritizing the individuals that make up them.
While reading through the opening of the Maastricht Treaty, I found myself immediately noticing how often the term “peoples” were used: it appeared in four out of the eleven goals and reasons stated for establishing the EU in the first two pages. It then appeared again in Article A, in the very first description of the Treaty, which reads, “This Treaty marks a new stage in the process of creating an ever-closer union among the peoples of Europe…”—not a union among the states, but instead, among the “peoples.”
Yet, for such a present word in the opening of the document, “peoples” virtually disappeared in the rest of the Maastricht Treaty, and any reference to unity and cooperation were made in reference to the “Member States” instead. To me, this disappearance demonstrates a fading out of the individual when European integration is considered and implemented on a macro scale. These individuals are those represented in Code Unknown, the people who make up another Europe that exist entirely outside of the Europe for the middle-class students we saw last week and the politicians in conference rooms, the writers of the Treaty, and the state-leaders that continue to implement terms of the Treaty to this day. When it comes the defining the extent of the European Union and of European integration as a whole, this linguistic pattern in the Maastricht Treaty and the characters and events that unfolded in Code Unknown demonstrate that the “Other,” which simultaneously gets defined when establishing “Europe,” are not just those who exist outside of Europe in Asia, Africa, or the Middle East; instead, they exist within Europe itself. Code Unknown features the individuals and the events that are frequently passed by, on the streets as well as in political documents. Their collisions—just as much a result and a driving force behind the success or failure of integration—are the ones unseen, especially in the bigger picture of economic development, globalization, and political union.
With the rising tone of nationalism that plagues politics today, stemming from the “peoples” who have gradually disappeared in the pages of the Maastricht Treaty and consumed within the umbrella of “Member States,” what does this means for the states themselves, which, as the Maastricht Treaty has made clear in its remaining pages beyond the opening, are the entities whom the goals and measures of integration actually rest on?
Since the late 1700’s the argument for the benefits of a European Union has been made, and the predictions of its necessity and advancements are very accurate to what we see today. However, it took until the formation of totalitarian states and almost domination of Europe for the Union to be developed.
In the writing of Jean-Jacques Rousseau he talks about the underlaying similarities that the different nations of Europe share, but that without a political union, they will consistently break truces and treaties when underlaying age old divides come back to light. The powers in Europe all want to protect and expand their own lands, and the result of this is constant aggression, and a mess of allies and treaties. However, no matter the number of wars, the general appearance of Europe has remained the same, no one nation has been powerful enough to overcome the alliance of the other countries, and even when an aggressive coalition of countries is formed, there is enough dissent in their union to allow the other countries to unite and defeat them. This was true until the formation of totalitarian states as stated in the Ventotene Manifesto which states “the State has been turned into a master of vassals bound into servitude, and has all the powers it needs to achieve the maximum war-efficiency.” This switch along with the advancement of technologies finally allowed a European coalition to conquer all continental Europe and it was only defeated by the involvement of forces outside of the continent. This directed the states of Europe to finally accept the idea of a union that would end the necessity for war, as well as bringing about many of the positives stated in Rousseau’s work; “Think of the waste of men, of money, of strength in every form; think of the exhaustion in which any State is plunged by the most successful war; compare these ravages with the profit which results: and we shall find that we commonly lose where we suppose ourselves to gain; that the conqueror, always enfeebled by the war, can only console himself with the thought that the conquered is still more enfeebled than himself. And even this advantage is more in appearance than reality; for the strength which has been gained upon our opponent has been lost against the neutrals who, without changing themselves, are nevertheless stronger relatively to us by all the strength that we have lost.”. This point by Rousseau is one of many that point to the total positives for all nations to unite and end the need for war. And although they still must protect from attacks from the outside, the threat of fighting a unified Europe will deter almost all invaders. And with the threats from both inside and outside gone, resources can be focused on betterment of the people. These benefits can be seen today in the European Union, and although it certainly isn’t perfect, many of Rousseau’s predictions were correct.
The European Union was created on a foundation that emphasizes unity. The main focus of the European Union was to bring together the people of a select few nations of the European continent (although the definition of what is the European continent is ambiguous). The key word is “select.” Not all nations that are considered or debated to be in the boundaries of Europe were first included in the original founding of the Union. Some of these nations are still not included in the Union. And for such reasons, nationalism has been a dangerous member of the European Union, causing more division than anything else. Because of this divide, I think that there has been a rising struggle of the “global” vs. the “local.”
The European Union, in this case, would be considered the “local.”. It is local in that its main focuses are on a select few nations, with a select population in mind, and it is also local is the egotistical/nationalistic way. This “local” mindset that has been instilled by the Union causes the sentiment of The Other, where all other groups that do not fall into the select few chosen by the Union are excluded and considered outsiders. This is where the idea of the “global” comes into play. The rest of the world outside of the Union would fall into the “global” category in that it is everything and everyone that the European Union has decided to not include in the community being built. Michael Haneke’s 2000 film Code Unknown shows this exact struggle between the global and the local, and the exclusion of “The Other” that is produced by the European Union.
Code Unknown represents the part of Europe that is excluded from the “local” limits of the Union. The characters from the movie are the people that are often marginalized in European society. One of the best examples is Maria, the woman from Romania, who is subject to poverty and is ultimately deported from France for just being at the wrong place at the wrong time, without even causing any trouble. At the time the movie was released (2000), Romania was still seven years away from being considered a part of the European Union. Romania was considered an outsider, representing countries of Eastern Europe that were considered too impoverished to be a part of the Union, and were often looked down upon as inferior to the Union countries. This also hints to the rising sentiments of nationalism in Europe in that countries feel superior to other countries, which is also portrayed in the movie with the scene of Jean throwing his trash on Maria. The fact the she is sitting and he is standing suggests dominance of the French over the Romanians.
These sentiments are reflected throughout Maastricht Treaty. There is a tension present between the inside and the outside, or the global and the local. Article F of the Maastricht Treat states, “The Union shall respect the national identities of its Member States.” This statement is true is the sense of how myopic it has proven to be, where Members of the European Union have difficulty in seeing beyond their own local scope within the Union. Members respect their own national identities most, have little respect to the identities of other Member States, and often tend to ignore the rest that do not fall into the select few included in these boundaries. The European States have a fear of recognizing the global, and tend to stay within the local boundaries. But Code Unknown proves that the local cannot hide from the global because the global will always be present.
However, France and Germany do have the positive benefits of being countries that are seen as financially stable and politically similar. To reference “Code Unknown,” there doesn’t seem to be a huge push for either of these Western, wealthier European countries to make efforts to more closely align themselves with some Eastern European countries, such as Romania, despite their integration into the EU for over 12 years. Going forward, I believe that, as “Code Unknown” comes to suggest, the uniting local forces ultimately won’t be enough to counter the rising push of global factors without proper discussion of how differing cultures can view themselves as one population.
Sorry, this is the full post of the previous comment which was cut off
I think that Daniela brings up an interesting point in there being a division between local (a select few countries within the European Union) and other global forces. I would like to suggest however, that as many local forces within the EU are being torn apart with the rise of nationalism within countries, such as the UK, this is not exclusively the case for France and Germany. This is because these two countries have just taken new steps towards being seen as 1, not just in their part as members of the EU, but also in their efforts in other international organizations such as the UN. I believe that, again as Daniela mentioned, this is in part fueled by nationalism, but instead of it being a driving force away from France and Germany and the EU, the political parties in charge of these two countries are trying to unite these two nations to counter the threat of nationalism.
However, France and Germany do have the positive benefits of being countries that are seen as financially stable and politically similar. To reference “Code Unknown,” there doesn’t seem to be a huge push for either of these Western, wealthier European countries to make efforts to more closely align themselves with some Eastern European countries, such as Romania, despite their integration into the EU for over 7 years. Going forward, I believe that, as “Code Unknown” comes to suggest, that the uniting local forces ultimately won’t be enough to counter the rising push of global factors without proper discussion of how differing cultures can view themselves as one population.
The film Code Inconnu presents themes of both connection alongside deep isolation between people, highlighting the the European union as a means to a somewhat unsuccessful end. Characters within the film tend to have a large – and often negative – impact on one another, as seen through such events as Maria’s sudden deportation resulting from Jean’s immaturity and disrespect. This ripple-effect of connection is contrasted with the even more prominent notion of isolation of understanding. This is first observed in the film’s subtitle, “The incomplete tales of several journeys”, which introduces the idea of a full dialogue not being communicated: that full stories will not be shared or understood. The first scene presents and compounds this idea with the image of a small girl acting out a mime of fear and isolation, and receiving no understanding from her peers in response. Further in the film, while Anne and her approximately middle-class white social group is sharing lunch, serious topics such as Georges’ experience in the war front and the news of a friend’s family being split apart by divorce are cut off in favor of more trivial matters. All these instance of poor communication via spoken language and body language relate to the idea that Europe as a union does not in fact automatically create a space where positive connections and understanding between citizens will exist.
Clearly, the prevention of interpersonal conflicts is not in the ballpark of the aims of such works as the Maastricht Treaty. However, such conflict and degradation of relations indicates through symbolism the imperfection of the EU as a way to unify nations. It highlights instead its imbalanced effect on different portions of the population, such as farmers versus urban dwellers, citizens of the EU versus non-citizens, minorities versus non-minorities, etc. Part of this limitation may stem from a statement within the Maastricht Treaty which reads, “…action by the Community shall not go beyond what is necessary to achieve the objectives of the treaty”. Therefore, as many of the Treaty’s objectives were perhaps a little vague or generalized, or up to the member states to organize, then comprehensive action to fix these issues may not ever occur. In other words, the Treaty acts as an incomplete measure to address all the issues put forth in the film; though there are aspects of the Treaty which have indeed been realized such as uniform currency and ease of transport between borders, for now.
I agree that Code Unknown is indeed a story about communication, or lack thereof. Most of the stories revolved around someone not understanding something, like Jean’s father not understanding his desires, Anne not understanding her situation in the room, the police not understanding Amadou, or Maria feeling out of place in France. The nonlinear, confusing segments being meshed together further added to this feeling of uncertainty and discomfort. What stood out to me the most were the long takes. I believe that every segment was one take, regardless of length. I think that this ultimately served to give the film a more intimate feeling. As a viewer, the film felt more like I was present in the situation, witnessing even the mundane activities, rather than watching something that was heavily edited.
The climax of the film was arguably the second scene that brought all of the characters together, representing the coming together of France, Africa, and Romania. The scene made me think of the Ventotene Manifesto, as one of the key points of the piece was arguing for “[preserving] a sense of human dignity.” The Manifesto spoke heavily on giving equal opportunity and freedoms to all, regardless of socioeconomic background. Amadou clearly has principles that parallel this ideology, as he was willing to even go to jail in order to defend Maria from disrespect. But I also wondered if his actions were necessary. Did he need to draw so much attention towards Maria, even when it was clear she did not want it? His intervention certainly seemed to be costly at the end as it caused her to be deported. I think that this brings up more questions regarding the role of countries in playing the role of caretaker for others, and if this in itself is dehumanizing or unwarranted.
Europe, as a whole, has usually had a similar culture across national boundaries. Thus, the argument for the formation of a European Union has been discussed since the 17th century. That being said, the hunger for power of monarchs and leaders stretching back centuries often prevented that from ever happening until the late 20th century.
In the meantime, wars and conflicts persisted across Europe, most notably World War I and World War II. Many proposed solutions to prevent such wars from ever occurring again. One of these said solutions was cited in the Ventone Manifesto. This piece, written by Altiero Spinelli and by Ernesto Rossi, proposed a system of European Federalism, as well as World Federalism. In their opinion, this was the solution to all the gruesome wars that had taken place throughout European History.
Within their argument, the two highlight the possible outcomes of pushing for a European Union. The most important piece of text within their writing is as follows: “The dividing line between progressive and reactionary parties no longer follows the formal line of greater or lesser democracy, or of more or less socialism to be instituted; rather the division falls along the line, very new and substantial, that separates the party members into two groups. The first is made up of those who conceive the essential purpose and goal of struggle as the ancient one, that is, the conquest of national political power – and who, although involuntarily, play into the hands of reactionary forces, letting the incandescent lava of popular passions set in the old moulds, and thus allowing old absurdities to arise once again. The second are those who see the creation of a solid international State as the main purpose; they will direct popular forces toward this goal, and, having won national power, will use it first and foremost as an instrument for achieving international unity.”
Spinelli and Rossi recognize their flaws and possible outcomes of pushing for a federal system in Europe. They see the two possible factions that may form, but point out why those with the goal to unite Europe will be triumphant.
My reaction to this piece is fairly simple. These men were wishful thinkers. While we did eventually something similar in the EU, Europe is again facing waves of rising nationalism and problems within the EU. One can predict all outcome, but it is impossible to predict the human behavior that can come out of uniting within a nation and thinking it would be better off without the baggage of other nations holding them back. I am left asking many questions. How would these men react to Brexit? What will risis of Nationalism in individual countries do to a federation?
This is an incredibly meandering, disconnected movie. Disconnected in the sense that it follows a few seemingly unrelated individuals apart from a brief interaction at the beginning of the film. Meandering in that chronology seems either unclear or even reversed. Many early scenes in the movie do not make sense until the viewer has seen later scenes. For instance, I thought Anne had died in the scene where she was locked in a room and told she would die by some psychopathic sounding individual only to see her in a later scene and realize she had merely been auditioning. This film took a while to properly grasp in ways like that. There was a perplexing scene where Georges sat on a subway with his camera. It felt like he was just sitting there awkwardly looking about as one might do on a subway, but in a later scene we see photos of countless people, apparently all on subways while someone (I assume Georges) talks about being in Kabul. It seems that Georges wears his camera around his neck on subways to take pictures of random faces. I can’t fathom why, but there’s that. I can’t figure what the directors aim with all this disjointedness is.
Nearly every scene in this movie bothered me in some way or another. I despised the scene where Amadou is on a date with some girl. It just felt so wrong to see him tell her he didn’t like her watch and for her to just throw it away right there. Then the way the girl on the date kept seemingly touching her wrist where her watch had rested moments before as if looking for its comfort and finding nothing in its place. Then there is the scene where Anne is ironing clothes and hears what sounds like horrific screaming and crying from her neighbor’s place, but she does not do anything and merely turns down the volume of the TV to hear it more clearly. Eventually the screaming dies down and Anne goes back to ironing and sipping wine.
I think the strangest piece of this film was not actually the general queasiness or badness of just about every scene, but the way in which the scenes are shot. It is incredibly minimalist. There aren’t really any edits to the scenes. Sometimes the camera moves around as the characters move. Sometimes the screen goes black for a brief moment and then skips to a new scene. That is about all that happens. The scenes themselves are usually incredibly mundane in what the characters are actually doing, though dripping in intensity at points, such as on the subway when Anne is harassed by some rowdy Arab boys. I do wonder why we are so often given such incredibly mundane, yet emotional scenes in this film. It feels very different from what I have seen previously in Hollywood.
Rousseau’s idealistic and Haneke’s pessimistic view on the unity and integration of society illustrates the complications of the European Union effectively.
On the one hand, Rousseau’s dream of a European federation paints a glorified picture filled with the benefits for the nations and the people. The federation should create lasting peace in Europe, ensure beneficial economic trade of labor and goods between the integrated nations, and contribute to the wellbeing of the people. These ideas have been partially fulfilled and can be credited by the European Union to some extent. Europe has been relatively peaceful following World War II, and particularly Western Europe has enjoyed free trade and a booming economy in these calmer years.
On the other hand, Rousseau fails to recognize the social context of creating a European federation, which is illustrated by Haneke in Code Unknown. Haneke portrays the persisting socioeconomic and racial tension in France, particularly through the second scene of the film. The viewer sees Jean, a young Frenchman who recently left his dad, throwing half-eaten food at a homeless Romanian woman. Amadou, a second-generation African immigrant, intervenes and demands that Jean apologizes to the woman. The whole scene ends in a fight between the two men, who are arrested by the police. Yet, the gravest consequence falls upon the Romanian, who is deported.
A second scene that further underlines complexities of immigration and society in France is the subway confrontation between Anne Laurent, and aspiring actress, and two Arab teenagers. The teenagers harass Anne Laurent, referring to her as a person from the elite portion of the society who will only ignore the rest. This explicitly addresses the tension Haneke emphasizes throughout the film and serves as the embodiment of how an integrated Europe still poses numerous societal issues.
Thus, the combination of Rousseau and Haneke portray the complex relationship between the nations of the European Union, including benefits such as lasting peace and free trade, and drawbacks such as the challenging integration of immigrants and social tension.
While watching this movie one of the only things that ran through my mind was “the ‘other’ Europe.” The Europe that is not publicized or talked about until you are in a class studying what Europe is, or like me another class that focuses specifically on racism and exclusivity in Europe. From the little changes in lighting and scene structure to the storyline that is shared on the screen, Code Unknown is a very different film than the one we saw last week, L’auberge Espagnole.
The lighting and camera angles, and how they are used, are vastly different than from last week. To start, the lighting is dark and dim, making the picture presented on the screen harder to see. One of the opening scenes was in the crowded streets of Paris, but it was rather dark like it was an overcast day, rather than the bright Barcelona shots that we got in L’auberge Espagnole. Another scene that comes to mind is when Maria makes it home and is meeting her husband for the first time since arriving, the air around them is filled with dust from the truck that passed beforehand, emphasizing the struggles of her home country. The scenes were also not pieced together like they were in the film from last week, from scene to scene it was not a continuous storyline, but a mix of them that all come together in a strange way. It was like watching three or four different movies that had been edited together to form one.
The representation of Europe is also very different than the one from last week; Code Unknown does not show different countries coming together for “the greater good” like the roommates in L’auberge Espagnole did while saving Wendy from the awkward meeting of her lover and her boyfriend. Instead, Code Unknown focuses on what happens to the working class population, immigrants, and Muslims living in Europe, and by that I mean the white, Christian Europe. Code Unknown shows the story of the father and son duo that have a farm and their own personal struggles with that fact- the father struggling with running and maintaining it while the son wants no involvement in it at all. It shows Maria in cuffs getting on a plane as she is deported back to her home country. It follows the Muslim family and their struggle of being both black and Muslim, opening their storyline with the eldest son, Amadou, being mistreated by police officers and taken in for questioning while Jean was not.
In short, this movie takes on a completely different perspective then the one that we witnessed last week. This movie focuses on the realistic side of Europe rather than on the idea of what and how Europe should be. Choosing to focus on the commoners, those who are most affected by the idea of a common Europe presents a storyline that can be understood by many, through the representation of reality for different groups in Europe.
Code Unknown initially struck me as incredibly different than L’auberge Espagnole – specifically from a cinematographic standpoint – in comparison to L’auberge Espagnole, Code Unknown had a much less linear and more convoluted plot with no clear resolution – in fact it’s hard to see what a resolution would even look like as Code Unknown is more of a collection of scenes loosely tied a central event than a specific, chronologically defined story. But if you look at the ideas that both films are trying to convey, this makes sense. As I wrote in my previous blog post, L’auberge Espagnole has a clear “Europtimist” tint to it: “Klapisch Klapisch shows that it is possible for people to forgo their national identity in favor of a broader, general “European” identity which in my opinion is the crux of his Europtimism.”
On the other hand, Code Unknown paints a bleaker picture, presenting the social difficulties that exist within the European Union today, specifically the difficulties that have come about with immigration, especially between geographic areas with such different cultures. This is a common theme in Code Unknown, and one could argue that Haneke is providing an artistic counterargument to Klapisch in the sense that it will be very difficult for people to forgo their national and/or cultural identity in favor of a broader, more general “European” identity (given that L’auberge Espagnole is centered around the experiences of middle class, highly educated students whereas Code Unknown involves characters from different socioeconomic backgrounds, in my opinion it paints a much more realistic picture).
For example, there are multiple instances in the film where we see instances of racism, specifically towards the Malian family. When Amadou confronts Jean for throwing trash on a Romanian homeless women, something that most viewers will agree is admirable (although there is definitely room for discussion about the method he used to do so) he is taken to police headquarters and his family’s apartment is unreasonably ransacked by police in order to look for some shred of evidence to try to detain him for something. On the other hand, white Jean is simply let go. Additionally, the Romanian homeless woman is deported to Romania despite doing nothing wrong. Given the modern day context of how Eastern Europeans tend to be looked down upon by Western Europeans, we can infer that this has something to do with her treatment.
These scenes demonstrate that many Europeans still have an “us vs. them” mentality regarding other Europeans of different cultures, despite the fact that they live on the same continent and are all Europeans at the end of the day.
The Ventotene Manifesto elucidates the harmful result of nationalism winning the battle between nationalism and Europeanism, demonstrating the importance of the balance between the two in order for harmony to exist in Western Europe. While some amount of nationalism is key for progress to occur in each nation, such as the “free movement of people and goods” that the Manifesto discusses, too much of it results simple in never ending violence.
Through details told slightly like a storybook, the Manifesto demonstrates the way that a war mentality degrades all aspects of life in these overly-nationalist nations before the EU came together. Because of the importance with which each country held itself, all countries felt threatened by others. Thus, all focuses were on war. Most powerfully, the Manifesto states that even during peacetime, there was in fact no focus on peace, on connection, or on harmony between these nations. Rather, the time was spent preparing for the next war that they knew would soon come. In this way, there was never a true feeling of concord, but rather an obsession with violence that seeped into every part of life, including schooling for young children, science studies, the government, and more.
The Manifesto successfully works as a tool of propaganda in support of the EU in a similar way as L’auberge Espagnole. While the Manifesto focuses more on the difficulties of the of the states while they are separate and L’auberge Espagnole focuses on the harmony that can come between the joining of these states, both work to create this idea that alone, no country is complete, but together, all of these countries in the union will be whole.
Here is my second blog of the week to make up for joining the class late:
My main criticism of Code Unknown is Haneke’s unintended effect of describing every human interaction as negative.
As discussed in class, Haneke illustrated a pessimistic view of society, rooted in all the conversations and actions between the characters of the movie. This is exemplified throughout the film, including the scene where Jean disrespects Maria and Amadou intervenes resulting in two arrests and a deportation, the scene where Amadou’s father has to cut his workday short as a taxi driver resulting in a clear act of distaste by the passenger, and the scene where the young Arabs harass Anne Laurent.
Furthermore, all the main relationships in the movie are portrayed as rough and complicated at best. Jean leaves his father, Anne Laurent constantly fights with her boyfriend, and Amadou’s family is in constant distress and worry. On top of that, the only significant scene that shows a happy family life turns out to be a part of a movie where Anne Laurent has a lead role. Haneke therefore implies that a joyful life is elusive and idealistic, in contrast to the true interactions and relationships of Code Unknown.
However, this dark illustration of society by Haneke is a risky one, particularly in combination with other important themes of the film, such as immigration, fragmentation, and social tension. The viewer may therefore interpret Code Unknown as a film that advocates against immigration, and thus can be misused by far-right groups for this purpose. Even though Haneke did not intend for this interpretation to occur, it is one he should have anticipated. Thus, although Haneke addresses several important issues in today’s Europe, he should have altered the film to clearly reflect that it is not a propaganda tool for anti-immigration.
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