Regulating and Transgressing the Borders of the Berlin Republic in Doris Dörrie’s The Hairdresser

This article considers how, in The Hairdresser (Die Friseuse, 2010), Doris Dörrie exposes the normalizing biopolitics of the Berlin Republic by offering an intersectional approach to thinking about discrimination in Germany and by establishing similarities between her white female protagonist and ethnic minorities. I examine how Dörrie employs ethnic minorities for her narrative by comparing The Hairdresser with Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s Ali: Fear Eats the Soul (Angst essen Seele auf, 1974), another film with an intersectional approach to depicting discrimination in Germany and one that is implicitly referenced by Dörrie’s cinematography. I argue that although Dörrie’s film could be viewed as advancing the discussion on discrimination in Germany by considering the intersection of additional categories such as disability and citizenship, her film is inhibited by neoliberal tendencies, its comedic genre conventions, Dörrie’s wish to establish an easy solidarity between Germans and ethnic Others, and her attempts to forge audience identification with the protagonist.