Germany after Year Zero: conceptions of community and the problem of incest in 1950s German films starring Heinz Erhardt

Abstract

The article discusses the legacy of the greatly successful 1950s films starring comedian Heinz Erhardt in West German culture. Special emphasis will be given to their ambivalence and the subtexts generated by the contrast between harmless narrative and the fostering of a subtle discourse about cultural self-understanding. One ubiquitous motive of the time is the production of the family as a metaphor for cultural institution building. This tendency is radicalized in the Erhardt films, which often include incestuous motives. Remarkably often this subject can be found in West German films of the time and will be read as radicalization of the family as an intimate collective that distances itself from society. Hence, the family as an ‘intimate collective’ functions as an antipode against the social realm, producing the illusion of coherency and security. The incestuous practices enable the social collective as a family collective to recapture self-confidence and a social future. The intimate relation of the individual to a family-like intimate social collective manifests itself in incestuous practices. Thus, it conserves the specific animosities generated in the postwar social and cultural realm.