A Wehrmacht soldier, celebrated in England - a few years after the end of the war. What sounds unlikely, football made possible. On May 5, 1956 runs in London's Wembley Stadium in front of 100,000 spectators, the FA Cup Final between Manchester City and Birmingham City, as Bert Trautmann immortalized.
In the 75th minute stormed an attacker on Manchester's German goalkeeper, hits him from full speed with the knee in the neck. Trautmann stays, is treated, gets up. He keeps playing because substitutions are not allowed yet. Manchester win 3: 1 thanks to his saves, Trautmann raises the trophy. Only days later, the diagnosis follows: neck break.
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"Trautmann": Because of splendid paradeThe German who helps his team to victory in mortal danger and is voted England's Footballer of the Year in the same year: a fabric as conceived by Hollywood writers and now actually on the big screen - albeit a smaller one, directed by Marcus H. Rosenmüller.
The filmmaker from Tegernsee has worked on his homeland so far, debuted with the Lausbubenkomödie "Who dies earlier is dead longer" and then created a trilogy about growing up in the Upper Bavarian province. Now he ventures out of the country, even over the English Channel, into the industrial North of the immediate post-war period.
Round leather, beautiful woman
Bert Trautmann (David Kross), who is actually Bernhard, lands as a prisoner of war in Ashton-in-Makerfield, a small town between Liverpool and Manchester. Here German soldiers are to be denazified and prepared for life in democracy. Depending on their views, they are classified in one of three categories: "Black" stands for convinced National Socialists, "knows" for opponents of the regime, "gray" for the followers.
Trautmann holds back, but does not say much about the condescending camp commander. An early scene leads him to what will keep the character in suspense for the next two hours: the round leather and beautiful Margaret (Freya Mavor), appropriately daughter of the local football coach, who is in desperate need of a new goalkeeper.
"Trautmann"
Germany, Great Britain, Ireland 2018
Director: Marcus H. Rosenmüller
Screenplay: Marcus H. Rosenmüller, Nicholas J. Schofield
Performers: David Kross, Freya Mavor, John Henshaw
Rental: SquareOne Entertainment
Length: 120 minutes
FSK: from 12 years
Start: 14th March 2019
It comes as it has to come: The initially stormy refusal gives way to a crush on Margaret, at the same time Trautmann advanced to become the star of St. Helens Town AFC. Manchester City pledges "Traut the Herb," leading to fierce debates among its supporters, until the Rabbi of Manchester, of all people, promotes giving the new goalkeeper a chance and judging him "by his personal value."
What tells Rosenmüller's film is mostly historically guaranteed, as read in the meticulously researched biography "Trautmann's Journey" by BBC journalist Catrine Clay. The native of Bremen, who rose in England from the hated German football legend, remained loyal to Manchester City for 15 years, was considered one of the best goalkeepers in the world at the time.
The war leaves no trace
But the director should not have succumbed to the kitsch danger lurking in the life story. Thus, the film fades out that Trautmann as a Hitler boy at 17 years to military service, reported as a paratrooper killed and counted in the POW camp to the category "black". In the same way that in 1948 Trautmann left his newborn daughter and her mother without saying goodbye.
Too much contradiction "Trautmann" does not want to impose his hero, this fits the cast with the boyish acting David Kross. From photographs of the real Trautmann looks a spent man, the traces of the war are unmistakable. Kross, on the other hand, does not put off the hardships, neither the participation in the "Enterprise Barbarossa" nor the military custody for sabotage, the fight against partisans or the Ardennes offensive.
In the video: The trailer for "Trautmann"
SquareOne Entertainment
Thus, heroic portrait and love drama stick together to Schmonzette, which hardly does justice to the historical figure. And yet, in its broken biography, the appeal of the material would have lain in the metamorphosis of the racist to the fighter for tolerance and the German-British understanding. But Rosenmüller gives away the chance of a parable about the changeability of man in favor of a pleasing Feel-Good-Movie.