The head of Vladimir Lenin’s statue hanging from a helicopter marks a turning point in Good Bye, Lenin! The 2002 film by Wolfgang Becker and starring Daniel Brühl recounts the aftermath of the fall of the Berlin Wall through powerful images, answering the question: how would an openly communist person in 1989 take the big break and the transition to a reunified, capitalist Germany?
The mother of Alex (Brühl) falls into a coma a few days before the fall of the wall. She, a woman of communist ideas, wakes up eight months later in another reality. However, fearing that she will relapse, her son goes to every length to prevent her from finding out that everything has changed. The lie gradually falls, as did the socialist ideals in the country and the statue of Lenin.
That image of the statue’s dismantling is a symbol of the decline of communism, very well reflected by Becker in the film. In real life, the statue was dismembered into more than 100 pieces and buried in different places — a way to erase the Soviet footprint. But as the film demonstrates, memories are hard to wipe away and are often recovered, even when the historical narrative inclines us more toward oblivion.
Does this mean that we should preserve these monuments? No. History must be remembered in order not to repeat it, but never to pay homage to the most violent and brutal ideals of history. People usually agree with this premise.
Art is being used to reflect the ideologies of an era, which means political decisions that are anchored in transcending memory. But when the people rise up and gain power, they want to tear these figures that symbolize dark times down from their pedestals, in many cases linked to dictatorial regimes.
In this scenario, destruction is a triumph.
In dictatorial regimes these monuments represent the egocentric thoughts of leaders who need to erect them to demonstrate their power and reach.
Lenin was not the only one to say goodbye. So many other monuments have collapsed around the world in turbulent times when the people want change, because with the fall of the statues, oppressive ideas crumble and freedom comes. Some of the most iconic falls mark society and the videos travel around the world. Saddam Hussein’s statue was one of those, a great blow that reverberated and announced the great crash, immortalized in images.
The propagandistic style offends people who have suffered thanks to the poor decisions of leaders, which is why the destruction of monuments is so symbolic. Other images that have fallen or been removed over the years are those of Josef Stalin, Adolf Hitler, Francisco Franco, Hosni Mubarak, among others.
Demonstrators in Coro, Venezuela, tore down a statue of the late President Hugo Chavez, President Nicolas Maduro’s mentor, as part of protests over his claimed victory in the election. pic.twitter.com/neyrAKHp6B
— CBS News (@CBSNews) July 30, 2024
A few weeks ago, people toppled around five statues of Hugo Chavez in Venezuela after Nicolas Maduro proclaimed himself as the winner of the elections while hiding the evidence. The content immediately went viral on social media.
Although this recent story has not made it into the movies, people use the cinema to explain reality. Chavez’s statues are seen as horcruxes that must be destroyed, just as Voldemort’s were eliminated. On the other hand, the severe censorship, repression and violence against the regime’s detractors, has provoked that those who use the social media in some cases speak in code to avoid reprisals, referring to characters and stories from Game of Thrones, Harry Potter, House of The Dragon and more.
Movies, television and literature are a reflection of society, but the people also often take these stories as a reference to contextualize their reality, demonstrating the power of art and entertainment, even if we believe it is only fiction.
Statues are part of history, but that’s not a good enough reason to leave them standing. In the rest of the free world, it is time to choose which representatives should be highlighted in a monument for the real value they have achieved.
In the meantime, viral videos of the great image drops will continue to arrive from the oppressed countries, hopefully until all the horcruxes are destroyed.