Burghart Klaußner is particularly good at playing men who expect to be obeyed. The stern fathers and officials can become familiar, but his pastor in The White Ribbon is a persuasive reason to keep watching.
Fi1m perspective
In The White Ribbon (2009), Burghart Klaußner’s pastor does not need to seem monstrous for the children’s fear to make sense. His religious authority is oppressive, but he belongs entirely to the village Michael Haneke puts before us. We were unsettled by the children’s obedience because Klaußner makes their fear of adults so credible. Beside Ulrich Tukur’s baron, he helps establish who is entitled to give orders and who has to live with them.
That performance followed a long stretch of supporting work in German cinema and television, with wider notice coming through Good Bye, Lenin (2003) and The Edukators (2004). Playing Alex’s father in Wolfgang Becker’s Good Bye, Lenin puts him within another family, though this is a much gentler film. Daniel Brühl and Katrin Sass do most of the work of keeping its elaborate premise believable. We like its warmth and humour, even when the story stretches the central conceit too far.
The danger in repeatedly casting Klaußner as a father, pastor or official is that the audience may feel it knows the man before he has done anything. The White Ribbon gives that familiarity a purpose: we look to the children for evidence of what such adults have taught them. Christian Berger shoots the village in black and white, giving this patient scrutiny a severity that suits Klaußner’s pastor. Haneke sometimes returns to fear and obedience more often than we need, but the performances remain convincing even when the point has been made.
The lead in Der Staat gegen Fritz Bauer (2015), playing the prosecutor Fritz Bauer, offered a different use for that authority. A justice figure need not carry the same threat as the pastor, and the part matters as a move beyond supporting work. His supporting role as Harald Ott in Steven Spielberg’s Bridge of Spies (2015) also continued his presence in historical drama. Start with The White Ribbon, provided an evening watching adults teach children to fear them is what you had in mind.
Biography
Burghart Klaußner is a German actor. Born in Berlin in 1949, he trained at the Max-Reinhardt-Schule für Schauspiel in Berlin from 1970 to 1972 after briefly studying German and theatre studies. He began his career on stage with engagements at theatres including the Schaubühne in Berlin, as well as in Cologne, Hamburg, Zürich and elsewhere, and made his screen debut in 1983.
He is known for supporting roles in films including Good Bye, Lenin! (2003) as Alex's father, The Edukators (2004) as Justus Hardenberg, The White Ribbon (2009) as the pastor, The Reader (2008) as a judge, and Bridge of Spies (2015). He has also appeared in television series such as The Crown (2016) as Kurt Hahn. Klaußner has narrated audiobooks and is a member of the Deutsche Filmakademie.
