Biopic
LOGLINE:
A rebellious young professor fights to overcome his failing health, the loss of God, and the betrayal of his country and kin on his path to salvation. The story of Friedrich Nietzsche, philosopher.
SYNOPSIS:
Friedrich Nietzsche is a young boy when his father Karl, a Lutheran pastor, passes away suddenly. Soon after, Nietzsche has a premonition of his younger brother's death that comes true, shaking his faith in religion. He is left with his younger sister Elisabeth, his mother Franziska, and his love of music.
As a young man of 24, he meets the composer Richard Wagner, one of the most prestigious men in Germany. They become inseparable friends and Nietzsche spends countless hours with Wagner and his wife Cosima.
Nietzsche grows uneasy with Richard's increasingly nationalist tendencies. Politics come between the two old friends and they part ways under bitter circumstances. Nietzsche's health declines and he is forced to resign from his position with the university. Alone and tortured he continues to work on his manuscripts, overcoming relentless pain.
When a Jewish friend and scholar, Paul Rée, introduces him to a promising young psychologist, Lou von Salomé, he immediately falls in love with her and proposes marriage. She rebuffs him and continues seeing Rée without Nietzsche's knowledge. The three do everything as a group and Nietzsche's health and demeanor finally stabilize in the wake of his split with Wagner.
Nietzsche's sister Elisabeth gets wind of the affair between Salomé and Rée. Elisabeth and Salomé quarrel publicly and Nietzsche bears the brunt of both their ire. The three friends can no longer tolerate the pressure and they go their separate ways leaving Nietzsche alone once more.
Nietzsche's health again falters and he is bedridden and close to death. He is at his lowest. Writing furiously and with renewed vigor, he recovers and completes the first part of his most famous work, Thus Spoke Zarathustra.
Elisabeth marries an ultranationalist, anti-Semitic nobleman, the proto-Nazi Bernhard Forster, causing Nietzsche and Elisabeth to break off talks with one another. Nietzsche again has a premonition, this time he envisions that his words will be used as propaganda causing great damage, despite their original intent.
Nietzsche finally goes mad from the same disease that took his father's life. Elisabeth takes control of his works, repackaging his philosophy for Adolph Hitler and the Nazi party. Despite the pain and suffering he endures, Nietzsche's final message is one of optimism and strength, a calling for generations to come.
2008 Nicholl Fellowship - Top 10%
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