It is the dead of winter 1946 in Hamburg and the war is over.Rachel Morgan (Kiera Knightly) has travelled to reunite with her husband, Lewis Morgan (Jason Clarke), a British colonel in charge of establishing control in a demolished city. ‘More bombs fell in Hamburg in one weekend than had fallen on London during the entire war’ Lewis tells his wife as they travel through the rubble-strewn streets. The Aftermath is a period drama based on Rhidian Brook’s novel of the same name.Directed by James Kent (Testament of Youth) and executive-produced by Ridley Scott, this handsome period drama promises a bit more than it delivers.
The complexity of the time is beautifully portrayed in this film. The tensions of rediscovering what marriage is, against the backdrop of the skeleton of what was Hamburg, is beautifully highlighted in what initially promised to be an historic drama. The Morgans arrive in their requisitioned stately home, greeted by its previous owner and architect, Stefan Lubert (Alexander Skarsgård) and his teenage daughter, Freda (Flora Thiemann) hostile to her family’s change of fate. Rachel holds nothing but contempt for anything German and her own restlessness.Her husband’s job is to oversee the transition. Colonel Morgan views conflicting emotions and suspicions running high between the British occupiers and German citizens. His feeling that there is no need for recriminations is his vision for rebuilding relations as much as the city itself. He finds that defending this, even to his wife, is necessary when he rebukes ‘The war is over. We won. That’s the end of it.’
The losses on all sides reveal themselves in a tangle of shared grief relevant to the core of this film. Knightley’s Rachel is strongly reminiscent of a 1940’s icon, with her smouldering gazes through windows and into mirrors in search of answers that aren’t forthcoming. Lewis, frequently called to attend to riots and attacks, frees him from attending to Rachel’s grief. Skarsgård’s Lubert quietly observes his place in the world around him, with a submission that was likely part of his role under Nazi rule as well.A tender scene of shared sorrow evolves into a love story. Although somewhat predictable, the romance does embrace the idea of relationships crossing political lines. In this way it evokes the films like Suite Française. Oddly, this tames a film that might have offered a stronger historic purpose, maintained by Jason Clarke’s thoughtful performance. Clarke is the real star of this film with his military control, his human need to move on, and ultimately, his reconciliation with death, betrayal and his own decency.
Franz Lustig’s cinematography beautifully captures the cold winter backdrop highlighting a feeling of loss for post-war Germany. With the victorious British governance comes a luxury of tea rooms and dinner parties, set against the stark existence of those Germans left homeless and in search of loved ones.Still, the juxtaposition of two different genres leaves both stories wanting.
Martin Phipp’s score sets the tone of the anguished household.The English and German dialogue helped create the broader divide in the screenplay by Joe Shrapnel and Anna Waterhouse. Despite the mixed results from the film’s navigating between history and romance, The Aftermath offers a rare view of a time and place immediately following the Second World War.