Abstract

This chapter analyses in detail Straub-Huillet's Kafka adaptation Class Relations, with special attention paid to language and power in the film and the filmmakers’ use of space, as this was their first film from which each scene was filmed from only one camera position. What this choice does to the place of the spectator in relation to the film's protagonist is related to the poems George Oppen wrote in his Discrete Series, especially in his effacing the role of an “I” narrator.

Keywords: Kafka, Straub-Huillet, Oppen, Discrete Series, Class Relations

“Above we affirmed that such languages and letters were under the sovereignty of the vulgar of the various peoples, whence both are called vulgar. In virtue of this sovereignty over language and letters, the free peoples must also be masters of their laws, for they impose on the laws the senses in which they constrain the powerful to observe them, even against their will.”

[The actors] are called to testify rather than merely be present on-screen and the entire film unfolds like a legal proceeding. Differences between protagonists and sidekicks, main and secondary characters, heroes and extras are erased in favour of a division of the roles between the accused, judge, prosecutor, lawyer, and witness.