April 20th 1999, Columbine, USA: Eric Harris (18) and Dylan Klebold (17) enter their high-school armed, opening fire, killing one teacher, 12 fellow-students, injuring 24 others before shooting themselves.
April 26th 2002, Erfurt, Germany: after being banned from his school just prior the graduation-week, Robert Steinhäuser (19) enters his school, the Gutenberg-High' with a pump-gun and a glock17, kills 12 teachers, two fellow-students, one secretary and a cop before shooting himself.
November 7th 2007, Jokela, Suomi: 18-year-old student Pekka-Eric Auvinen enters his school, opens fire, kills 5 fellow-students, one nurse, principal Helena Kalmi and a college-student before killing himself...
Ihr könnt Euch niemals sicher sein." None of you can ever be sure."
17-year-old Oliver (Ludwig Trepte) has to haul with his parents to the German city of Cologne. At his new high-school, the quiet, introverted and serious student quickly becomes a maverick. In German-lesson he writes a review of the Goethe-classic Die Leiden des jungen Werthers / The Sorrows of Young Werther" in a rap-lyric-pattern. His teacher Selma Vollrath (Anneke Kim Sarnau) disagrees with his way of interpretation, she finds it rude, improper, not attractive and not politically correct, so she disses him in front of the class and gives him 0 points. If you recall John Cusack's teacher in The Sure Thing" (Der Volltreffer"): this one is the opposite. Oliver reacts upset but not yet overly aggressive. Briefly later, Vollrath finds a note with a rap-lyric-excerpt from Oliver where he talks dirty about her and mentions violent thoughts (serious: who of us never had one against a teacher and vice versa?). In hysteria she strikes alert.
In the next briefing, the faculty argues about Oliver and whether or not he should get banned from school. An other German-teacher cites excerpts from Oliver's Werther"- review and acknowledges it as lyrically interesting, highly expressive and definitely a new form of doing a review. Furthermore he realizes that Oliver obviously can set himself into the emotional situation of the main-character, inserting similarities from his own life-situation. The progressive teacher argues with Selma Vollrath: Well, I find it amazing! We have a student with obviously a fine sense for language, versing and it's rhythmic possibilities and expressive options. And YOU as his teacher fail to see that! I'll take him."
But it appears to be too late. The police searchers Oliver's room and confiscates his PC, to find a banned violent game on the hard-drive, and in his closet an old gun from Oliver's deceased WWII-vet-grandpa. Oliver's father despite his uncertainties- remains calm first, trying to keep further pressure away from his son, but can't succeed about it against his sensible wife, the teachers and the cops. Oppressed by the faculty and the cops, his scared parents get him into a mental-institution instead of seeking convenient discussion with him and listen to what's in his heart & mind. After a couple of days his therapist correctly analyzes that Olivers mental situation is that of a stressed and uncertain teenager but in a normal scale for that age and life-situation and releases him.
Oliver then has already bonded friendships to a young, mentally unstable woman from his unit, as well as outside to a Russian-German immigrant and his posse. Those two persons will play significant parts during the climax and thereby critically reflect and outweigh the narrow-minded clichés and conservative prejudices, that the broad German public tends to associate with to those two arctypes" another great accomplishment of this terrific movie. In his newly won peer-group, Oliver can score with his rap-talent (the scene reminds a little of the stage-battle" in 8 Mile") and -for the first time- earns respect, regardless his not-Russian origin.
When I was in 6th grade at the Orientierungsstufe I" in Hann. Münden (a school-format that was folded approx. two years ago), I took English-lessons in the A-class (in the Orientierungsstufe, students were sorted into A-, B-, and C-classes, depending on their skills), taught by regularly Make-Up-overdosed Mrs. Julia W. for about half a year. This particular teacher finally mobbed me so far to leave the A-class -despite generally good figures and skills- and on own demand joined the B-class of Mrs. S. I mean, what do you say about a teacher who regularly verbally bullies you with comments like Enzo*, if I ever get a heart-attack, you'll surely be one of the reasons!"?
Or Werner F., my class-teacher in the FOS-Desgin" in Göttingen/Godehardtstrasse, who oppressed me that regularly, that I one day vented my frustration into a quick drawing, showing me chopping his head off with a medieval Axe, rich detailed with a 3 feet blood-fountain and identifiable faces. Unfortunately I lost it, I guess...
Did I ever consider to really do it? No. The feather is mightier than the sword and now here it is for everyone to read, you two dorks.
In the following years I also played DOOM and other brutal games and still today I listen to Heavy Metal (among others) and watch zombie-flicks and? I'm a social-worker today, age 36, set in my tracks and consider myself a mainly convenient person. Only that Volksmusik" and Schlager"-crap on German TV makes me wanna go havoc...
I wonder what would go on in my hometown Hann. Münden, when a broad public would come aware of the fact, that the local high-school (Grotefend-Gymnasium") has already been virtually rebuild by a student in 1994 with a DOOM-editor. That fellow measured the whole school with a scaling-tape systematically for that purpose (...).
Surprisingly nobody in such a discussion ever did or does acknowledge, that such a programming demands exact planning, rich creativity and technical skills, a huge cognitive pending and a sharp perception for the architectional environment, which also gets trained in the process (...).
(please read the full comment in the discussion board and let's hear your experiences from YOUR school-time and raise an argument. Thank you)
April 26th 2002, Erfurt, Germany: after being banned from his school just prior the graduation-week, Robert Steinhäuser (19) enters his school, the Gutenberg-High' with a pump-gun and a glock17, kills 12 teachers, two fellow-students, one secretary and a cop before shooting himself.
November 7th 2007, Jokela, Suomi: 18-year-old student Pekka-Eric Auvinen enters his school, opens fire, kills 5 fellow-students, one nurse, principal Helena Kalmi and a college-student before killing himself...
Ihr könnt Euch niemals sicher sein." None of you can ever be sure."
17-year-old Oliver (Ludwig Trepte) has to haul with his parents to the German city of Cologne. At his new high-school, the quiet, introverted and serious student quickly becomes a maverick. In German-lesson he writes a review of the Goethe-classic Die Leiden des jungen Werthers / The Sorrows of Young Werther" in a rap-lyric-pattern. His teacher Selma Vollrath (Anneke Kim Sarnau) disagrees with his way of interpretation, she finds it rude, improper, not attractive and not politically correct, so she disses him in front of the class and gives him 0 points. If you recall John Cusack's teacher in The Sure Thing" (Der Volltreffer"): this one is the opposite. Oliver reacts upset but not yet overly aggressive. Briefly later, Vollrath finds a note with a rap-lyric-excerpt from Oliver where he talks dirty about her and mentions violent thoughts (serious: who of us never had one against a teacher and vice versa?). In hysteria she strikes alert.
In the next briefing, the faculty argues about Oliver and whether or not he should get banned from school. An other German-teacher cites excerpts from Oliver's Werther"- review and acknowledges it as lyrically interesting, highly expressive and definitely a new form of doing a review. Furthermore he realizes that Oliver obviously can set himself into the emotional situation of the main-character, inserting similarities from his own life-situation. The progressive teacher argues with Selma Vollrath: Well, I find it amazing! We have a student with obviously a fine sense for language, versing and it's rhythmic possibilities and expressive options. And YOU as his teacher fail to see that! I'll take him."
But it appears to be too late. The police searchers Oliver's room and confiscates his PC, to find a banned violent game on the hard-drive, and in his closet an old gun from Oliver's deceased WWII-vet-grandpa. Oliver's father despite his uncertainties- remains calm first, trying to keep further pressure away from his son, but can't succeed about it against his sensible wife, the teachers and the cops. Oppressed by the faculty and the cops, his scared parents get him into a mental-institution instead of seeking convenient discussion with him and listen to what's in his heart & mind. After a couple of days his therapist correctly analyzes that Olivers mental situation is that of a stressed and uncertain teenager but in a normal scale for that age and life-situation and releases him.
Oliver then has already bonded friendships to a young, mentally unstable woman from his unit, as well as outside to a Russian-German immigrant and his posse. Those two persons will play significant parts during the climax and thereby critically reflect and outweigh the narrow-minded clichés and conservative prejudices, that the broad German public tends to associate with to those two arctypes" another great accomplishment of this terrific movie. In his newly won peer-group, Oliver can score with his rap-talent (the scene reminds a little of the stage-battle" in 8 Mile") and -for the first time- earns respect, regardless his not-Russian origin.
When I was in 6th grade at the Orientierungsstufe I" in Hann. Münden (a school-format that was folded approx. two years ago), I took English-lessons in the A-class (in the Orientierungsstufe, students were sorted into A-, B-, and C-classes, depending on their skills), taught by regularly Make-Up-overdosed Mrs. Julia W. for about half a year. This particular teacher finally mobbed me so far to leave the A-class -despite generally good figures and skills- and on own demand joined the B-class of Mrs. S. I mean, what do you say about a teacher who regularly verbally bullies you with comments like Enzo*, if I ever get a heart-attack, you'll surely be one of the reasons!"?
Or Werner F., my class-teacher in the FOS-Desgin" in Göttingen/Godehardtstrasse, who oppressed me that regularly, that I one day vented my frustration into a quick drawing, showing me chopping his head off with a medieval Axe, rich detailed with a 3 feet blood-fountain and identifiable faces. Unfortunately I lost it, I guess...
Did I ever consider to really do it? No. The feather is mightier than the sword and now here it is for everyone to read, you two dorks.
In the following years I also played DOOM and other brutal games and still today I listen to Heavy Metal (among others) and watch zombie-flicks and? I'm a social-worker today, age 36, set in my tracks and consider myself a mainly convenient person. Only that Volksmusik" and Schlager"-crap on German TV makes me wanna go havoc...
I wonder what would go on in my hometown Hann. Münden, when a broad public would come aware of the fact, that the local high-school (Grotefend-Gymnasium") has already been virtually rebuild by a student in 1994 with a DOOM-editor. That fellow measured the whole school with a scaling-tape systematically for that purpose (...).
Surprisingly nobody in such a discussion ever did or does acknowledge, that such a programming demands exact planning, rich creativity and technical skills, a huge cognitive pending and a sharp perception for the architectional environment, which also gets trained in the process (...).
(please read the full comment in the discussion board and let's hear your experiences from YOUR school-time and raise an argument. Thank you)
