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Monday, May 19, 2008

GERMANY YEAR ZERO (1947)

The least known of Roberto Rossellini’s ‘classic’ Neo-Realist trilogy made just after WWII (ROME: OPEN CITY/'45 and PAISAN/'46 preceded), this story of a family struggling to survive conditions in bomb-ravaged Berlin aims to be powerful stuff, but suffers from the usual Rossellini failings in technique & terminology. Though it’s shot on actual locations with a mix of non-professionals & actors, there’s no mistaking its schematically designed rip-snorting melodramatic Italian soul. The dichotomy between method & material is particularly blatant on the Image DVD with its dubbed Italian soundtrack. (Rossellini was a stickler for using whatever language the situation called for. Is this his approved Italian release edition?) The narrative is run by a scavenging boy of 12, toughened by the torturous physical aftermath of total war and by the ideas he picks up from his crushed family, from the street bandits he tries to befriend and from the half-digested mix of Hitler, Nietzsche & Darwin espoused by a former teacher, now a pederast pimp. Film academics have overvalued Rossellini's output for decades, but except for OPEN CITY, the public have never bought in. And even that film owes its general acclaim largely thru two intensely theatrical turns from Anna Magnani & Aldo Fabrizi.

NOTE: The Rossellini's 'War Trilogy' has recently appeared in superior DVD editions from Criterion. This title now boasts the 'original' German soundtrack.

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