Spring 1941

The film in a serious subject, but far too often the shaky cam forces the audience to look away missing much of this movie. If you like nausea and headaches check it out. Otherwise simply skip this one. Its really surprising to me that in a day in age when there is so much hardware available to directors to keep video smooth and professional that something like this could ever get made. Directors and Investors: It doesn't matter how good your script is, if you make your movie look like a middle school phone camera youtube video, we can't watch it.

A very well acted emotional story illustrating the atrocities of the Germans in WWII. I found some of the scenes very disturbing though thought provoking as to what depths the human race can sink to. Films like this must be made to capture new generations who far too often are ignorant of history or have history glossed over to maintain current day international relations and sensitivities.

The filmmakers went to the trouble of shooting much of this movie in Poland, and maybe they benefited from something invisible in the atmosphere but there is rather little happening outdoors in the movie and I couldn't have told whether it was shot in Poland or in Poughkeepsie. Because so much of the film occurs in the small space of a peasant's hut, you could mistake it for a stage play with a few cinematic scenes tacked on. And the screenwriter, Motti Lerner, does in fact write mostly for the stage. It could be that audiences were surprised by the relative weight of the indoor part of the story, where everything depends on the interaction of the actors and their movement in a space no bigger than a stage; and by the relative weight of the interplay between the characters living in fear of the Nazis, as opposed to actual encounters with the Nazis themselves. But if you accept that the emphasis lies where it does, then you'll certainly be glad that for once Uri Barbash directed a script by an independently successful playwright rather than by his brother Benny (no offense intended). The actors do a great job of selling the story, and the script does a great job of showing a human dilemma of conflicting priorities with life and death at stake.

This is one of the best holocaust dramas I've ever seen, maybe the best. Superbly acted, plotted, directed, photographed. Engrossing, emotional. I loved the flashbacks and "flash forwards", if that's the word. Every character is believable, and you feel for every one. The last five minutes are truly excellent.

The basic storyline for the movie is actually quite emotional (no spoilers, I'm not going to give it away) and teh acting is good, as you might expect from the strong cast.

HOWEVER the direction is absolutely amateurish! There are so many ploy holes that you really have to be asleep not to ask "how did that happen" or "how de he/she know that, or see that?" You could say that most of these are due to a bad script but they all seem to be just a case of poor direction and directorial almost contempt for his audience. You could, I suppose, still enjoy teh movie but the plot holes make so much of the storyline not make sense that I don't see how.

Definitely not one that I could recommend and, by teh way, the Germans invaded Poland in Autumn 1939 and the Russian part of Poland in Summer 1941....