A War Between Sides or a Novi Sad Genocide?
In January 1942, the Novi Sad massacre involved the murder of 3,000-4,000 civilians in the Backa region of a hungarian-occupied Yugoslavia. The victims, mostly Serbs and Jews, were forced to march across the river Danube and murdered as shelling from the Hungarian officers on shore broke the ice. After this massacre, a full investigation and trials of those involved intended to serve justice. However, a culture of silence around the event prevailed until the 1960’s, when cultural production in eastern Europe began to reflect with the traumatic past of the Holocaust. Literature, art and film that touched on this history included Tibor Csere’s book Cold Days and Andras Kovács film (1966) based on the book. The film Cold Days especially had an enormous impact on Hungarian society and national identity. According to Agnes Heller, after the film was released, "Hungarians for the first time since the end of the war spoke about the Jews as victims. Before it, there had been only Fascists and Communists” (Klimó, "1956 and the Collapse of Stalinist of History," 760).Politics Based on this quote, it seems that this film was able to disarm the notion of the Holocaust as a war, replacing it with a conception of the events as a genocide. However, Cold Days is known for its focus on the the perpetrators of the massacre and its explorations of the justifications behind their actions. This, coupled with Hellers quote raises the question of how a film that seeks to understand and humanize the perpetrators of the Holocaust as Cold Days does could help Hungarian society see the Jews as victims of a genocide? An analysis of this film reveals that by bringing his viewer into the jail cell of convicted Hungarian officers, Kovács is able to show the psychology and rationalizations of the men, all of whom yearn for a clear conscience after their participation in the Novi Sad massacre. Furthermore, as one of the officers realizes his wife and child were killed in the very massacre he perpetrated, the director puts this character in the position of both victim and perpetrator. This story line showed the audience that anyone could be a victim of the Holocaust, no matter what “side” they were on. As a result, Cold Days was uniquely able to present the Holocaust as a genocide with victims and perpetrators, rather than a war with two sides.
Throughout the movie, as each of the Hungarian soldiers tries to shift blame for the massacre onto another, Kovács uses this unique perspective of inside their private jail cell to expose the men’s psychological justifications for their actions. Most importantly, though, the director portrays these rationalizations as ridiculous justifications rather than legitimate excuses. In one scene, for instance, the commanding officer who orchestrated the massacre shouts “how did I end up among these murderers” (Iordanova 78). and argues that his hands are unstained, that he was simply giving orders. But, as Iordanova points out in her analysis of the film, Kovács makes it quite clear that “each one of [the men] is an essential link in the chain of a massacre”, making this shifting of blame seem almost pathetic. When the viewer watches these four murderers scramble for justifications to clear their conscience, they begin to understand a more human side of the men. This effect is prominent in one particular scene, when an officer new to the jail asks the other men if they murdered during the massacre. One of the men replies immediately: “You: murder, Me: strict orders” after which the commanding officer shouts “Not everyone is a murderer! Stop it! Change the subject.” From this exchange it becomes clear to the audience that for these men, remembering the massacre and their roles in the murder of thousands of people is worse than the massacre was itself. This scene also highlights how some men cited following orders as an excuse for their participation in the killings while others suffered from denial of the murders all together. Very few Holocaust films took the perspective of the perpetrators. Further analysis of these men’s memories of the massacre shows the viewer how the humanization of the Hungarian soldiers may have acted as an agent in shifting the national memory of Novi Sad from an event in a war to a genocide.
One particular officers’ story of his wife being executed on the Danube unfolds throughout the film. It is not completely clear if the officer was witness to his wife’s death on the river, however, his attempts to evacuate her and their child, and her subsequent accidental detainment, suggest this to be so. Their deaths are implied in one of the first scenes in the film, when a lieutenant enters the cell and the soldier asks if there is any news of his wife (who the soldier has summoned as one of his witnesses in his trial in an attempt to locate her). The following exchange unfolds between the men:
LIEUTENANT: “I asked Nuremburg. No trace”
SOLDIER: “There wouldn’t be any. The Germans hold back their witnesses”
LIEUTENANT: “Not in this case”
The lieutenant suggests that in this particular instance, the Germans were not being as secretive about or withholding their witnesses, implying that if the soldier’s wife was alive, she would have been located. Following the indication of his wife’s death, an unmistakable look of doom covers the soldier’s face as both he, and the audience, realize his wife was in fact massacred. Now, the soldier must live with “the nightmare-ish knowledge of having taken the wrong action, of being guilty without being prepared to acknowledge his own, albeit indirect, part in his wife and son’s own deaths” (Iordanova 77). In this specific storyline, this character has become both a perpetrator and a victim of the massacre. Before this film, Jews were almost exclusively given the label of “victim” in Holocaust memory. However, this particular plot line breaks that mold, bringing a Hungarian perpetrator of a horrific massacre into the “victim” category. He has both lost his own loved ones and taken away the lives of many during the same event. Before this film, Hungarian society viewed the Holocaust as a war between Fascists and Communists, with a clear winner and loser. With this horrific twist of fate, the viewer can no longer deny that World War II was a genocide with victims and perpetrators and that anybody, even a perpetrator, could be a victim of his own crime.
By bringing the viewer inside the jail cell of convicted Hungarian Officers, Kovács reveals the tortured psychology of the men as they scrape for justifications or excuses for their participation in the Novi Sad massacre. The director humanizes them further via the storyline of one Hungarian soldier who lost his wife and son in the very massacre he perpetrated. With this plot line the film shows the audience that anyone could be a victim of the Holocaust. As a result, Cold Days was able to convey the events in Novi Sad as a genocide, rather than simply a battle between Fascists and Communists, and was uniquely equipped to break the silence around the massacre. This films’ release contributed to a memory boom in Yugoslavia, Novi Sad in particular. In his article,"1956 and the Collapse of Stalinist Politics of History: Forgetting and Remembering the 1942 Újvidék/Novi Sad Massacre,” Árpád Von Klimó informs his reader that “Beginning in the second half of the 1960s, as a result of the international trends in Holocaust remembrance and the debates initiated by the book and film Cold Days the city of Novi Sad began to publicly commemorate the 1942 massacre” (Klimó 760). Taking the perspective of the perpetrator in film and literature was rare and quite possibly offensive in when Cold Days was made. However, when András Kovács takes this perspective, the director is able to expose the complexities of the actors in the massacre, as well as the genocide itself, to his viewers. As a result, this film disallowed its audience from viewing past events as anything but a genocide.
Throughout the movie, as each of the Hungarian soldiers tries to shift blame for the massacre onto another, Kovács uses this unique perspective of inside their private jail cell to expose the men’s psychological justifications for their actions. Most importantly, though, the director portrays these rationalizations as ridiculous justifications rather than legitimate excuses. In one scene, for instance, the commanding officer who orchestrated the massacre shouts “how did I end up among these murderers” (Iordanova 78). and argues that his hands are unstained, that he was simply giving orders. But, as Iordanova points out in her analysis of the film, Kovács makes it quite clear that “each one of [the men] is an essential link in the chain of a massacre”, making this shifting of blame seem almost pathetic. When the viewer watches these four murderers scramble for justifications to clear their conscience, they begin to understand a more human side of the men. This effect is prominent in one particular scene, when an officer new to the jail asks the other men if they murdered during the massacre. One of the men replies immediately: “You: murder, Me: strict orders” after which the commanding officer shouts “Not everyone is a murderer! Stop it! Change the subject.” From this exchange it becomes clear to the audience that for these men, remembering the massacre and their roles in the murder of thousands of people is worse than the massacre was itself. This scene also highlights how some men cited following orders as an excuse for their participation in the killings while others suffered from denial of the murders all together. Very few Holocaust films took the perspective of the perpetrators. Further analysis of these men’s memories of the massacre shows the viewer how the humanization of the Hungarian soldiers may have acted as an agent in shifting the national memory of Novi Sad from an event in a war to a genocide.
One particular officers’ story of his wife being executed on the Danube unfolds throughout the film. It is not completely clear if the officer was witness to his wife’s death on the river, however, his attempts to evacuate her and their child, and her subsequent accidental detainment, suggest this to be so. Their deaths are implied in one of the first scenes in the film, when a lieutenant enters the cell and the soldier asks if there is any news of his wife (who the soldier has summoned as one of his witnesses in his trial in an attempt to locate her). The following exchange unfolds between the men:
LIEUTENANT: “I asked Nuremburg. No trace”
SOLDIER: “There wouldn’t be any. The Germans hold back their witnesses”
LIEUTENANT: “Not in this case”
The lieutenant suggests that in this particular instance, the Germans were not being as secretive about or withholding their witnesses, implying that if the soldier’s wife was alive, she would have been located. Following the indication of his wife’s death, an unmistakable look of doom covers the soldier’s face as both he, and the audience, realize his wife was in fact massacred. Now, the soldier must live with “the nightmare-ish knowledge of having taken the wrong action, of being guilty without being prepared to acknowledge his own, albeit indirect, part in his wife and son’s own deaths” (Iordanova 77). In this specific storyline, this character has become both a perpetrator and a victim of the massacre. Before this film, Jews were almost exclusively given the label of “victim” in Holocaust memory. However, this particular plot line breaks that mold, bringing a Hungarian perpetrator of a horrific massacre into the “victim” category. He has both lost his own loved ones and taken away the lives of many during the same event. Before this film, Hungarian society viewed the Holocaust as a war between Fascists and Communists, with a clear winner and loser. With this horrific twist of fate, the viewer can no longer deny that World War II was a genocide with victims and perpetrators and that anybody, even a perpetrator, could be a victim of his own crime.
By bringing the viewer inside the jail cell of convicted Hungarian Officers, Kovács reveals the tortured psychology of the men as they scrape for justifications or excuses for their participation in the Novi Sad massacre. The director humanizes them further via the storyline of one Hungarian soldier who lost his wife and son in the very massacre he perpetrated. With this plot line the film shows the audience that anyone could be a victim of the Holocaust. As a result, Cold Days was able to convey the events in Novi Sad as a genocide, rather than simply a battle between Fascists and Communists, and was uniquely equipped to break the silence around the massacre. This films’ release contributed to a memory boom in Yugoslavia, Novi Sad in particular. In his article,"1956 and the Collapse of Stalinist Politics of History: Forgetting and Remembering the 1942 Újvidék/Novi Sad Massacre,” Árpád Von Klimó informs his reader that “Beginning in the second half of the 1960s, as a result of the international trends in Holocaust remembrance and the debates initiated by the book and film Cold Days the city of Novi Sad began to publicly commemorate the 1942 massacre” (Klimó 760). Taking the perspective of the perpetrator in film and literature was rare and quite possibly offensive in when Cold Days was made. However, when András Kovács takes this perspective, the director is able to expose the complexities of the actors in the massacre, as well as the genocide itself, to his viewers. As a result, this film disallowed its audience from viewing past events as anything but a genocide.
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