A Tale of Two Princes and a Mermaid

Brenda 2022-04-19 09:03:02

The legends of mermaids and Wentini are in the same line. In Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tale, the mermaid goes ashore because she loves the prince, but the condition for going ashore is that if the prince betrays her love, she must kill the prince and return to the sea. In the end, the mermaid chose to save the prince and returned to the sea and turned into foam. In the modern "fairy tale" of "Wendini", Wentini has two "princes": her ex-boyfriend and the new boyfriend she just fell in love with. Wentini thought that the appearance of her new boyfriend meant that the rules of going ashore were no longer binding her, but the price of death was borne by her new boyfriend for her. In order to save the person she loves, Wentini chooses to complete her mission, kill her ex-boyfriend, and return to the bottom of the lake by herself.

It's a pity the movie doesn't make it clear how this fairy tale relates to the city of Berlin and the Vergangenheitsbewältigung (Reflection on History). Perhaps the film is trying to say that the new era and the relics of the old cannot coexist. Or maybe the movie wants to say that old buildings cannot be real monuments even if they are forcibly restored/rebuilt.

When I visited the Humboldt Forum last year, the Forum representative said that the construction of the Forum would "give back" the former cityscape to Berlin. But as Wendine herself mentioned the Humboldt Forum is going to restore the 18th century castle as a new museum. But "restoration" is a lie, because an 18th century castle in the 21st century is not a real 18th century castle, it's always a knockoff.

View more about Undine reviews