Germany, Year Zero – THE CRITERION COLLECTION #499 (as part of Roberto Rosselini’s War Trilogy) (a J!-ENT DVD Review)

October 20, 2010 by Dennis Amith 

“Germany, Year Zero” is a tragic film, a gut-wrenching, powerful film that every cineaste must see.  And if you haven’t bought this DVD box set just yet, Roberto Rosselini’s “War Trilogy” is highly recommended!

Image courtesy of © Cinecitta Luce, Renzo Rosselini and Kramsie Ltd. © 2010 The Criterion Collection. All Rights Reserved.

TITLE: Germany Year Zero – THE CRITERION COLLECTION #499 (as part of Roberto Rosselini’s War Trilogy).  The film is also known as “Germania anno Zero” (Italy) and “Deutschland Im Jahre Null” (Germany).

YEAR OF MOVIE: 1948

DURATION: 73 Minutes

DVD INFORMATION: Black and White, Dolby Digital Monaural, 1:33:1 Aspect Ratio, Subtitles: English SDH

COMPANY: Janus Films/The Criterion Collection

RELEASED: 20010

Directed by Roberto Rossellini

Story and Screenplay by Roberto Rosselini

Screenplay and Dialogue: Max Kolpe

Producer: Roberto Rosselini

Original Music by Renzo Rosselini

Cinematography by Robert Juillard

Edited by Eraldo Da Roma

Art Direction by Piero Filippone

Starring:

Edmund Moeschke as Edmun

Ernst Pittschau as Il Padre

Ingetraud Hinze as Eva

Franz-Otto Kruger as Karl-Heinz

Erich Guhne as Il Maestro

Heidi Blankner as Frau Rademaker

Jo Herbst as Jo

Barbara Hintz as Thilde

Roberto Rossellini is one of the most influential filmmakers of all time. And it was with his trilogy of films made during and after World War II—Rome Open City, Paisan, and Germany Year Zero—that he left his first transformative mark on cinema. With their stripped-down aesthetic, largely nonprofessional casts, and unorthodox approaches to storytelling, these intensely emotional works were international sensations and came to define the neorealist movement. Shot in battle-ravaged Italy and Germany, these three films are some of our most lasting, humane documents of devastated postwar Europe, containing universal images of both tragedy and hope.

Germany Year Zero – The concluding chapter of Roberto Rossellini’s War Trilogy is the most devastating, a portrait of an obliterated Berlin shown through the eyes of a twelve-year-old boy.

When it comes to Italian neorealism, Italian filmmaker Roberto Rosselini is one of the masters in showing life of the poor and working class, using nonprofessional actors and how they dealt with life during or after World War II.

Among the films that Rosselini was known for is his “War Trilogy” which all three films are now available in a DVD box set courtesy of the Criterion Collection.

The trilogy first began in 1945 with “Rome, Open City”, an Italian war film about Rome during Nazi occupation in 1944, Rosselini was able to show viewers the destruction of Rome shot two months after the Nazi’s evacuated the city.  In 1946, Rosselini released the second film in the trilogy about the Italian campaign against the Nazi’s who were losing the war against the Allies.

But in 1948, Rosselini created his final film of the war trilogy known as “Germany, Year Zero” that would show life in post-war Germany and shot in a war-torn Berlin and to show how life has been for Germans a year later after losing the war.  Families were struggling, people did not eat and because of their loss after World war II, factories were dismantled, jobs were lost and the once strong and forceful Germany was now shattered and economic recovery for the country would not happen until a decade later.

“Germany, Year Zero” is a film about the life of a 12-year-old boy named Edmund Kohler (played by Edmun Moeschke).   He is currently living in a bombed out apartment with five other families and his father Mr. Kohler (played by Ernst Pittschau) is a sick old man who can’t bare to see how his family is suffering and feels that his disability is hurting the family and preventing them from having a better life and at times, wishes he was dead.

Meanwhile, Edmund’s sister Eva (played by Ingetraud Hinze) tries to make money for the family and like many young women at the time, makes her money through prostitution (although she is often thought of as giving her services to Allied officers).  Despite her current profession, Eva tries to keep the family together.  Meanwhile, their brother Karl-Heinz (played by Franz-Otto Kruger) is a former Nazi soldier who has not registered with the new police force because of his fear that he will be punished for being a Nazi.  Karl-Heinz is so afraid that he stays at home and not make any money and thus the father is disappointed in him and wishes he would take responsibility and sign up.

But most of all, the family finds it tough that they are letting the young Edmund to find odd jobs to help bring food and money to the family.

Edmund doesn’t want his brother to get in trouble, he doesn’t want his sister to be involved in bad things and doesn’t want his father to die, so he tries to make money to make the family survive.  But unfortunately, he can’t get work because he is too young.  But when he runs into his former teacher, Herr Henning (played by Erich Guhne), a man who profits from the sale of Nazi artifacts and is still dedicated to the Nazi cause, the naive Edmund feels his former teacher can inspire hope.

But what Edmund doesn’t know is that Herr Henning is also a pedophile who prays on children and looks to Edmund as a pure boy that he can corrupt by getting him involved in the underground with other children/teens.  His way of also getting close to the children.   Young Edmund learns about making money by scamming people, stealing and also being introduced to sex and the worst part of it, Edmund’s family knows that he is going to get corrupted and don’t like it but yet they do nothing.

But with his family suffering and his father getting sicker by the day, can this young boy help his family and survive in the streets?  Or will he do something much darker and something he will truly regret?

VIDEO:

“Germany, Year Zero” is presented in (1:33:1 aspect ratio) black and white.  According to the Criterion Collection, the pictures have been slightly windowboxed to ensure that the maximum image is visible on all monitors.

Criterion Collection also mentions that for decades, the available versions of the three films included in the “War Trilogy” have been based on later generation elements exhibiting both physical wear and tear and printed in dirt and damage.  These defects have often been attributed to the circumstances under which the films were made.   “Germany, Year Zero” has never been seen in the US in its original version, with German opening titles and its complete and correct original language soundtrack.   The new high definition digital transfer was created on a Spirit 2K Datacine from 35mm fine-grain master positive.

The film required extensive digital restoration using MTI’s DRS system and Pixel farm’s PFClean system, to remove by hand, dirt, debris, stains, scratches, splices, warps, jitter and flicker.  Digital Vision’s DVNR system was also used for fine dirt, grain and noise reduction.

With that being said, I’ve always have been told that Rosselini’s “War Trilogy”, in the past, versions that people have seen were in bad condition, so to have them released in the best quality possible, is a major service to fans of these films.  “Germany, Year Zero” does have its times where there is some flickering and typically with films created during war time or even shortly after wartime, I’ve noticed that there was no adequate lighting at times and you see things getting dark from time to time.  Fortunately, for the majority of the film, the video presentation was fine.  You see more grays than whites but once again, considering how badly the films were to begin with, I do believe that the fact that it is watchable with no major defects is a plus and presentation was good.

If anything, cinematographer Robert Juillard did a fantastic job in showing us images of destroyed Berlin and how people were at the time.  Just the scene of a dead horse and all these people rushing to cut it up for meat, I’m not sure how Rosselini got that shot.  Was the horse dead already and he had little Edmund going by it.  We know people in Germany were starved, so much of that scene was actually real?

So, there are a good number of powerful shots in this film and was quite pleased with Criterion Collection dedicating their time in bringing these films out in the best presentation as possible.

AUDIO:

“Germany, Year Zero” is presented in monaural German with English subtitles.  According to the Criterion Collection, the monaural soundtracks for all three films were mastered at 24-bit from the corresponding 35mm optical tracks.  Clicks, thumps, hiss and hum were manually removed using Pro Tools HD.  Crackle were attenuated using AudioCube’s integrated workstation.

For the most part,”Germany, Year Zero” does come clear through the center channel but in a few scenes, you can hear a bit of hiss in the background but it’s not distracting but it is there in a few scenes.

Overall, audio is clear and understandable.

SPECIAL FEATURES:

“Germany Year Zero – THE CRITERION COLLECTION #499” comes with the following special features:

• Introduction by Roberto Rosselini - (3:42) Filmmaker Roberto Rosellini gives us a quick introduction of how the film is the last of his War Trilogy and what the film is about.
• Italian Credits and Prologue - (2:50) Although the original German language soundtrack film is featured on the DVD, the Italian release of the film had Italian credits and voice-over prologue.
• Roberto Rosselini - (1:05:40) A documentary by filmmaker Carlo Lizzani tracing Roberto Rosselini’s career through archival footage and interviews with many of his family members and collaborators.
• Letters from the Front: Carlo Lizzani on Germany Year Zero - (23:21) Carlo Lizzani was the only Italian to work on Rosselini’s international crew for “Germany Year Zero”.  As Assistant director for the film, at a Tutto Rossellini conference in 1987, he reads excerpts from letters that he wrote about the production while on set to his friend and art critic Antonello Trombadori (who helped get him the job on the film).
• Adriano Apra - (12:40) Film historian and teacher Adriano Apra, who has devoted much of his career to Roberto Rossellini and his films discusses “Germany Year Zero”.
• Paolo and Vittoria Taviani - (7:52) Filmmakers Paolo and Vittorio Taviani (“The Night of the Shooting Stars”) saw “Paisan” as adolescents and credit the film with inspiring them to become filmmakers.  The two talk about Rosselini’s films and how it had an influence on them.
• Roberto and Roswitha - An illustrated essay by German film scholar Thomas Meder, author of the book Rosselini’s “Paisan” and “Klaus Mann” in which Meder researches Rosselini’s relationship with Roswitha Schmidt, his mistress from 1942-1946 and Rosselini’s connection to Germany.  Using your remote, you can cycle through the essay.

EXTRAS:

“Paths of Glory – THE CRITERION COLLECTION #538″ comes with a 20-page booklet which includes an essay by author James Naremore titled “We Have Met the Enemy…”.

“Germany, Year Zero” and the other two Rosselini “War Trilogy” films is perhaps the absolute masterpiece from the filmmaker known for his neorealism.

Rosselini did not wait when he shot these films for things to get better, he shot them not long after the Germans were driven out of Italy and for “Germany, Year Zero”, shot a year after their loss in the war.  The truth is that World War II and war in general takes a toll on people and in Germany’s case, the German citizens would pay the price for their involvement in the war.

No one wants war, no one likes to see people hurting, struggling and whichever side you’re on, unfortunately, everyone pays a price and in this case, Germany would pay the price by the dismantling of various industries (where many were employed), food was scarce, people were unemployed and the majority of Germany after World War II was severely damaged by heavy bombings.

“Germany, Year Zero” is one of those films that show us the plight of German citizens and it is absolutely amazing because as he had done with his previous two films, we see Germany in destruction and how people were at the time.  How he was able to get so much access to film in Germany, we don’t know.  How certain scenes were in his film, such as the dead horse that people started to cut up for meat, we don’t know.

Since his last film “Paisan” in 1946, Rosselini was going through several changes in his personal life.  From the death of his son nine-year-old son Marco (whom he dedicates “Germany, Year Zero” to him) and a few affairs with a German and years later to one of his most well-known women he had an affair with, Ingrid Bergman.  But aside from his personal life, for the making of “Germany, Year zero”, it was also a film which shows the heart of Rosselini.

In 1948, not much is known on how Roberto Rosselini, an Italian man would get so much access to film in Germany but if there is one thing he knew that he could do, that was to help people.   And because of his neo-realistic filmmaking,  seeing the human conditions of the non-actors in his film, he brought these Germans from his film to Italy (for the indoor portions of the film) and make sure that the people in the film had something to eat and were taken care of.

French filmmaker Francois Truffaut wrote, “I know it’s a dangerous thing to say, but I believe it is true that Rosselini doesn’t really like cinema particularly, any more than he cares for the arts in general.  He prefers life, he prefers man.  He never opens a novel, though he spends his life gathering social and historical facts”.

Truffaut continued, “The truth is that Rosselini is not an ‘activist’ nor is he an ambitious man. He is an inquirer, a man who asks questions, who is much more interested in other people than he is in himself.” (both quotes from Francois Truffaut, “The Films in My Life”)

With “Germany, Year Zero”, this is a film that hits you hard but at the same time you know there is nothing good that can come out of this.  It’s how life was that point of time, people were starving and the last thing they should expect help from are the Allied soldiers or people who detested the country for the crimes they have committed against others.

I’m sure at the time, people felt that Germany’s citizens deserved all the suffering for what their countrymen had unleashed in other countries but when you watch this film, Rosselini who lost a son, who had his country invaded by Germans, he saw things differently.  He literally has filmed adolescence without sentimentality.

When you show soldiers or adults suffering, some people don’t cringe because they felt, karma is now serving sweet justice.  But Rosselini was careful to make sure the characters featured, you can feel sympathetic.  An older man, the father of the family who is too sick to work and bed-ridden, a daughter who can’t make any money for her family thus she becomes a prostitute and a younger brother who is fully capable of working but yet, the family is not making much and the only one willing to do the grunt work is a young 12-year-old boy.

A boy who is so persistent, caring for his family and does all he can but realizes, it’s almost futile.  He is too young to work and the only things he can do is by scamming people.  But this is a naive boy who doesn’t what is right and wrong because everyone around him is suffering, they are negative about their own living conditions that when he constantly hears his father telling him that he wishes he was dead, so they can have a better life, he wonders…is it true what his father is saying?  Will life be better if his ailing father is not around?

The boy doesn’t have the answers, so he looks to others to give him the answer.  But unfortunately, he’s surrounded himself with the worst people that are not there to help but to corrupt him in the worst way possible.

As for this DVD, once again I have to mention how happy I am that Roberto Rosselini’s “War Trilogy” was released by the Criterion Collection.  The crew put a lot of hours to ensure the three films were the best presentation that anyone has ever seen before.  I’ve only heard how bad the qualities the films were in the distant past but now we have the ability to see these films in the best quality possible.  Quite frankly, I’m sure it is premature to say this, as the year is not over but I feel this is one of the top 3 DVD releases from the Criterion Collection and I probably may put it at #1 for 2010.  Sure, it’s not on Blu-ray but the fact that these important films have been released, it’s hard to complain.  This is an awesome set!

As for”Germany, Year Zero”, this film is a true Rosselini neorealism masterpiece.  Rosselini is the master at war films and showing the struggle that people faced during that time.  Not shot at a studio, nor does it showcase talented actors or were these films trying to rally the troops and inspire one to fully represent their country.  This film is a historical document that shows bombed out building, suffering people and Rosselini happened to be there.  To shoot a film and show people the surroundings of a once powerful country now in shambles.  But in our very eyes, we see a young naive boy slowly being corrupted to the point in which he does the unthinkable and now realizes the burden he must live with.

“Germany, Year Zero” is a tragic film, a gutwrenching, powerful film that every cineaste must see.  And if you haven’t bought this DVD box set just yet, Roberto Rosselini’s “War Trilogy” is highly recommended!

Note: Review below is for the film and not the entire box set