Institute Benjamenta (Or This Dream People Call Human Life)
Directors : Stephen Quay, Timothy Quay
UK, 1996
"the Fräulein is crying" - a wonderfully evocative phrase. Just four words, but they say so much and yet leave so much more mysterious and unsaid. In fact, the whole sentence as written is "But the Fräulein is crying?". How much more mysterious still the addition of the question mark makes it! I was so taken with the phrase that I included it in my little experimental short, Evening.
It was written by Robert Walser, an interesting and somewhat eccentric Swiss writer of the very early 20th century. He wrote sometimes on scraps of paper in such impossibly tiny script that it was often difficult to decipher. It is also worth noting that he was one of the earliest writers to bring descriptions of the life of a salaried employee to the German language, and in so doing became an important influence on Franz Kafka. Without Walser, there is no Kafka; and if there is no Kafka, then I think my life would be rather different. The novel Walser wrote his sentence in was 'Jakob Von Gunten', published in 1909. Walser based it loosely on his own experience attending a school for servants in Berlin.
The Quay Brothers describe 'Institute Benjamenta' as a kind of parallel world to 'Jakob Von Gunten'; essentially similar but by no means exact. How to even begin to describe this film? It is undoubtedly a piece of symbolist art.
"The symbolists used characteristic themes of mysticism and otherworldliness, a keen sense of mortality, and a sense of the malign power of sexuality"
Jakob arrives at the Institute to enroll, stating his desire to learn to be of service to someone, as he has no real hopes in this life. He is measured up, literally, by Herr Benjamenta, who checks him over as one would livestock. Already we have a double symbolism. 1) It soon becomes apparent that the Institute teaches only lessons designed to crush the spirits and resistance of its pupils, to reduce them completely to a state of servitude. The pupils do not seem particularly downtrodden by this. Only on this most recent viewing, probably my 4th time through, did I really notice the character of Krauss, "monosyllabic Krauss", who is elevated in his servitude to such a level of serenity. Krauss is laughed at by Jakob for his lack of ambition and self, before being put straight by Lisa, who explains his role simply and beautifully, even saying he is sent by God. But we are already straying. Such wanders are bound to occur, 'Institute Benjamenta' is like all artworks, you cannot view it in any strictly linear fashion; it must be viewed, broken from, thought about, re-approached, seen from different angles, and each time there will be something new, something rewarding. Exactly like Kafka, you could say. 2) As Jakob is measured (like an animal), he is shown in the shot above, sitting in a chair so that a pair of antlers mounted on the wall in front appear to rise from his head. As Herr Benjamenta measures his head, he also measures up in the air in such a way as to show the viewer that he is measuring these antlers as though they were a part of Jakob. The antlers, and the image of the stag, will go on to become part of a complex symbolism of sexuality in the film. It prepares us, though we initially don't know it, for Jakob as two things; as a symbol of an incoming sexuality, and as a chosen one in a religious sense. Jakob is the accidental rebel, the holy fool. On his introduction, he begs to be given his own room, apart from the other students, and it is granted to him. Already, he has special status.
Herr Benjamenta later in the film discusses with Lisa a dream that he had, in which Jesus has visited. Jakob, and we, hear only a snatch of the overall conversation, in which Herr Benjamenta ponders the reason for Christ's visit to this small corner of the world and his purpose here. If all of this has not yet directed our attention, it is pushed for us onto Jakob's role later on, when in a moment of confusion, Herr Benjamenta appears to refer to Jakob as Jesus.
Jakob is not a good student. He fails to follow the lessons, he cannot, will not succeed at becoming nothing as the others. In one memorable and hilarious scene, he punctuates the mechanical miming of his duties with a series of increasingly loud and creative scenarios, building to a parody of self-flagellation while he is circled by the Fräulein Lisa, clearly curious and clearly rather taken with him. Now we are introduced to the "malign sexuality" of the symbolists. The Quays are never blatant in their approach, and their deep and heavy symbolism is all the more powerful and erotically charged for it. In the first such scene, Lisa, drifting away from her class in her mind, rubs her hand in a straight line across the blackboard, erasing the chalk work there (including a servant's face). We have here the idea of lust or desire obliterating the careful order.
The symbolism is so deep that we can look even further. The straight line has meaning, because the lessons are so focused on circles, which themselves are representations of the 'zero' the students are to strive to become. The straight here is foreign, alien, and its introduction brings the entire class to a stunned standstill. Is this symbol deliberately phallic? Perhaps so, perhaps not. Lisa begins to slowly unravel as she gives in to the nervous energy. Her dress, so tightly bound in the very image of Victorian propriety, becomes loose, half-opened, dishevelled, like she is being defiled before our eyes. Another remarkable scene sees a serviette folded to the shape of a mitre and placed upon Krauss' head. He and the students then chase Jakob, flicking at him with their serviettes; are they trying to expel the demon that has possessed the Fräulein?
Jakob finally gains entry to 'the inner chamber', but is confused to find only a goldfish tank. Krauss stands behind with two buckets, forming a scale, a symbol of weighing up judgement. Jakob explains that he is taught how to clean the goldfish bowl, change the water, and feed the goldfish. He wonders whether an 'inner chamber' really exists at all. We are shown images at various times of water running down walls, of the Fräulein lying, naked, wet; obvious Freudian symbols. We are shown the water being poured away from the bucket into a grate, it is suggested the two images are linked, that access to the inner chamber is another layer of symbolism. Krauss and the Fräulein seem intensely aware of this, in fact everyone does, except for Jakob, our poor holy fool.
I have told all this, and yet we have scarcely scratched the surface of this film. Its themes, meanings and symbols could go on to occupy pages more. I have not come back to the symbolism of the stag, the stag's foot pointer carried by the Fräulein, the events of the end of the film, the religious singing at the Fräulein's door, the later symbolism of her elevation to sainthood. But one person can only say so much about this film, and it will always somehow be inadequate or lacking, incomplete.
