DVDs this time.
David and Margaret reviewed Wunderkinder (2011) and gave it three stars each. I would agree.
Review by David Stratton
WUNDERKINDER is the word for child prodigies in German and the film of that title concerns three young musicians in the Ukraine in 1941. Violinist Abrascha – ELIN KOLEV – and pianist Larissa – IMOGEN BURRELL – are both Jewish and study under Irina – GUDRUN LANDGREBE. Hanna – MATHILDA ADAMIK – is the daughter of a well-to-do German couple, her father manages the local German-owned brewery. Hanna is desperate to learn and play with the two Russian youngsters, to become their friend.
When Russia and Germany declare war the tide turns as the Germans invade the Ukraine. Now the German family is protected but the Jewish children are in danger.
Wunderkinder is dedicated to the 1.6 million Jewish children who were killed during World War II. The director was Markus Rosenmueller who has worked mainly in television and his rather pedestrian and predictable approach somewhat undermines the power of the story. It is an interesting situation, these people caught on the varying tides of war, and ultimately a tragic one. Young Elin Kolev impresses as Abrascha, but there is a lack of subtlety to the other characters that hampers performance. Undoubtedly made with the best of intentions, it is nevertheless a film which seems a bit overwhelmed by the seriousness of its agenda.
One point David and Margaret don’t mention is that this film was made for young adults:
…It is in its politics that the film does a disservice to its viewers (whose recommended ages are 12 and 13, by the way). First of all, the Ukrainian characters speak fluent and perfect German; certainly, this is a convenient tactic used by many films in order to avoid the trouble of subtitles. In this case, however, the film’s exportation to North American necessitates that we all read the subtitles, all the time, so what difference would a few Ukrainian phrases have made? In any case, it seems that a film so heavily indebted to historical accuracy and invested in showcasing the very real horrors of war and fascism might consider being a little more faithful to the events it depicts. Don’t underestimate the ability of pre-teens to read subtitles.
Moreover, the film’s final point (that an evil Nazi colonel will murder anyone, including you and your family) is driven home with a disturbing cartoonishness that risks making a supernatural caricature out of the very real historical tragedy of Nazism. The colonel in question is a flat, predictable character whose sole pleasure is derived from narrowing his eyes and barking anti-Semitic pronouncements at anyone who will listen. This portrayal denies the complexity of the philosophy, politics, group mentality that fostered Nazism; gravity is lost in this simplistic sketch of evil…
Nonetheless well worth seeing.
Yes, Elim Kolev really is very good. And he isn’t merely an actor – something else David and Margaret didn’t mention.
Elin Kolev was born on 17 December 1996 in Germany. He began his musical education on the violin at the age of 5 at the Robert Schumann Conservatory in the City of Zwickau. At the age of ten, he was admitted at the Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy University of Music and Theatre in Leipzig in Professor Carolin Widmann’s violin class. Additionally, Elin studied master courses under Professors Dr. Friedemann Eichhorn, Thomas Brandis, Reiner Kussmaul and Igor Ozim…
At the age of 16, Elin possesses great ease of playing the violin, through which he can master even the most difficult violin methods through his impressive demeanor and joyous talent. His technical maturity is demonstrated through sophisticated bowing methods and his precise sensitivity to changing tonality even down to the smallest detail, and also through his ability to think his way into the musical piece, and thereby to understand its mood…
The second DVD is a 2013 issue (thus in excellent condition) of a classic from 1957:
Yes, The Three Faces of Eve. Click the image too!
Great performance, but the whole thing has not worn at all well. I rather agree with this by Jim Hunter:
This film is the portrait of a woman with multiple personality disorder.
I think Ken Hanke of Mountain Xpress best summarizes my opinion of this film: “It once seemed daring; now it seems simplistic.” At the time, 1957, this film probably portrayed a little-known condition with little-known Freudian treatment, so that the popular audience had to be assured of the subject’s verisimilitude, hence the framing narrator vouching for the film’s accuracy to a point that the narrator “doth protest too much methinks.” But now, Eve’s condition is portrayed more like Thing from another World with magical and threatening music toning in every time one of Eve’s personalities appears. It becomes heavy-handed, and for an audience that has seen Raising Cain, among all the other films about multiple personalities, it’s trite.
That said, Joanne Woodward is fantastic, fully creating each personality and delivering a performance that of the “they don’t make ’em like that any more” variety. I also liked the film’s feminist overtones. Ralph is an appropriate villain, and making him the villain, the film impugns patriarchal culture.
The story’s construction is also faulty in parts. There’s no need for Woodward’s song, and who the hell is Earl? He suddenly appears like the deus ex machina he is, and we have no reason to think of him as a worthy goal.
Overall, The Three Faces of Eve is a film to see because it’s a classic, but unlike most good classics, it has been imitated and refined to the point that it lost its originality and spark.
Neil's Commonplace Book 