Reviews

... this movie is not a complete disaster for anyone under 60. Seriously, it has become impossible to be fair to TV movies produced by ZDF without knowing that their audience is approaching 60, on average. This movie is no different. It's another movie about the German past in what was east Prussia until 1945, about the wounds the war has caused for Russians and Germans, and how suffering in the end brought together the decent people from sides. Unfortunately, the movie is neither truly dealing with the subject intellectually (the only notable quote in this context being - "there is no mathematics of guilt - maybe not, but it is always important to look at the beginning") nor is it emotionally convincing. Wolfgang Stumph's acting isn't really convincing for someone suddenly being forced to discover his own roots and have his identity challenged.

Chulpan Khamatova is playing his young beautiful female guide in Kaliningrad, and, in an excruciating plot move, falls in love with the chubby foreigner who's not at all interested in her, and just to make the whole thing completely ridiculous, follows him back to Germany in the end where his son is instantly attracted to her. Seriously, I think someone should be punished for subjecting Chulpan to these parts of the script.

All in all, I think this is a decent movie to watch with your grandparents, or great-grandparents, if you'd like to talk to them about the past, just to ease in on the subject. Otherwise, Chulpan is the only reason to watch this film - but then again, for that, you could also watch Goodbye Lenin again.

About three years ago, I read about this story in a magazine. I instantly contacted a friend who is a film producer and told him about what I thought would have to be a wonderful movie. Although he told me that some others were already planning to do this, my hunch was right. Great story, great film, although I agree that both Führmann and Krüger aren't exactly doing a good job when they are dubbing the touching soprano's and tenor's voices. I wouldn't actually say that she's bad, but for a woman confronted at the same time with the horrors of the trenches and the human spirit's ability to overcome them, while trying to save her lover from this place, her performance is not, well, particularly emotional.

Bizarrely, even for Germany, the version released to cinemas across the country this week is almost entirely dubbed in German. This, I might say, adds some strange kind of comedy when ordinary soldiers from the trenches act like they don't understand the other while both speaking perfect German. On the other hand, it makes the German lieutenant, who actually speaks both English and French look overly ridiculous when he tries to utter "chouette".

There are so many memorable moments in this film it is hard to come up with them all, even immediately after leaving the theatre. But I particularly loved the opening scene in which three little boys, in Germany, France, and Britain respectively, are standing in front of a blackboard and are repeating the jingoist everyday rhetoric of the day, and the scene in which the church leader is preaching to new Scottish troops that they are on a crusade against evil, right after he "fired" the field priest for performing the Christmas mass with the soldiers who fraternised with each other.

In any other context, I would have said this is over the top, too open a reference to the religiously influenced jingoist rhetoric of certain world leaders of this day - but I'm pretty sure it's an accurate reflection of the indoctrination of 1914-1945. And that's even more scary.

Quite frankly - Jolie, Pitt, tens of millions of Dollars, and even a cute story (despite the lack of any kind of solution at all...), and this movie is the result of the effort? I am surprised not more people seem to be disappointed. My initial reaction was that someone in the screening room should have sent them back to the editing room with an editor who has a better feel for rhythm. Don't get me wrong, this movie isn't bad. It's even fun to watch if you aren't constantly concerned with how much better it could have been. Example? Just think of their dancing scene... it is sterile. One of the most passionate moments in the film, and there is no passion at all visible - it's not bad acting, it's bad editing, in my impression. And this is what I felt all the way through the movie - starting in the psychiatrist's practice... there was no rhythm, no groove, something was missing that could have been there. Their fight at home? It was their way of dancing, and I think it was possible to see Pitt and Jolie attempt to, yet we could see Pitt inelegantly kicking Jolie lying on the floor... just one of the many images in line with what made this a great movie that could have been.