Alemanha, Ano Zero

This is the third film in Rossellini's war trilogy; the other 2 films are Roma citta' aperta (Rome Open City) and Paisa. I thought this film was of the same quality as Paisa. Rossellini continues to use the same sort of staging and neorealist style as before. It's interesting to see the footage of (mostly destroyed) Berlin... It's interesting to see how a director from a country that was once allied with Nazi Germany decides to portray postwar life in Germany. A bleak film, but very Rossellini-ish: children as important characters, sexual perversion equated with moral turpitude, the telescoped-in time frame. As in his first film, Roma citta' aperta, Rossellini provides an intense story. Neorealism can sound dry--and some of the neorealist films were rather depressing and not exactly fun to watch--but this film is definitely more than watchable.

Rossellini's films just after World War II are to be appreciated as both social comment and for artistic advancement in the matter of film. This film, like no other, deals with Germany as a vanquished nation, driven downward toward annihilation. Edmund, a young boy, made to beggar himself in order to survive, gives one of the truly authentic portraits of youth driven to despair ever seen on the screen.

How used to sentimentality we Americans had become by the time Rossellini made this desolate vision of a destroyed post-war Europe.

How coddled and led astray were we by image after image of dimpled, freckled kids clutching hold of their pets. Children the likes of Mickey Rooney or Dean Stockwell. How engaging...and yet how unreal.

Edmund isn't just a child, we learn. But more so, a country.

A nation bombed into rubble and tasting its own ashes. Stripped of everything of any value and reduced to zero. Rejected by everyone and forced into murder...in the end made to stare death in the face.

Germany YEAR ZERO will shock you. Make you wince as the tragedy of a nation corrupted unfolds, and self-destructs.

Edmund is no longer just a boy made to suffer in a world he never made. In the end he's our conscience.

This masterpiece, filmed while the action and subject matter of the film, was at its most intense, is a must see. Featuring non-professional actors, in the neo-realist style which defined post-war Italian cinema, you will experience a lyrical view of Germany, actually devastated Berlin. This is how it was at Hour Zero, or "Anno Zero" when new currency was introduced, and the economy started again from scratch with each German receiving the same (very little) cash to rebuild their lives, and indeed their country. The film has magnificent scenes including the voice of Adolf Hitler coming from a record player among the ruins of the Chancellery, deaths in gutted buildings, and several especially poignant scenes of the young boy who has known nothing but misery during his few years of life, yet continues his fight to survive.

One of Roberto Rossellini's masterpieces, Germany Year Zero, suffers only from one minor liability, which is not totally the filmmaker's fault. The film was shot in German with the native language, but it was later shown around the world (at least I think around the world) in an Italian-dubbed print, which is also the version currently available on American DVD. True, Rossellini (as far as I know) didn't speak German, and he had it in Italian so he wouldn't have trouble getting the film distributed in his native land where he broke ground with Open City and Paisan. But it is a fair enough indication that not EVERYTHING in a film such as Germany Year Zero is based in total reality based on seeing this version. Once this is looked past though, one can get into the actual story and characters, which is what Rossellini is after- getting at least the emotional loss in this world perfectly clear.

Germany Year Zero - the third in a so-called trilogy of films that began with his breakthrough Open City and continued with Paisan - was brilliantly executed, in the quasi-documentary cinematography by Robert Juillard, the appropriately sorrowful score by Renzo Rossellini, and in the performances by first timers like Edmund Moeschke as Edmund Koeler (the main character), Ingetraude Hinze as Eva Koeler (Edmund's desperate sister), and Erich Guhne as Herr Enning (Edmund's ex-teacher who becomes a crucial supporting character). Edmund is a pre-teen who's lived through the devastation of the War, like his family, the families he lives with, and everyone else around him in the city, and he tries to get work despite his all-too-young age. Things seem bleak for his family, as his brother doesn't want to work for fear of being caught as a prisoner of the war, his elderly father can't work, and his sister goes out every night looking for things that only help herself. When Edmund runs into his once school-teacher (Enning), who is part of the cold, evil remnants of the Nazi regime, and this leads into the last act of the film, with startling, heart-breaking results.

While the story of Edmund- and of the line that scorches a kid's conscience between childhood innocence and the horrors of the real world- is a compelling and historically important one to tell, what Rossellini achieves here more than anything is the sense of dread in a desolate atmosphere. He achieved that in Open City too (I have yet to see Paisan so I can't comment), but that film had the tendency to take a little too much time involving us in sub-plots. In Germany Year Zero, however, the images presented stay with the viewer long after the film has ended since they're akin to the kind of sensibility Polanski had with The Pianist, in a technical sense- we're following someone in his own personal struggle for survival in an environment that's in rubble, with many of the people around the character without much hope. There's also the theme of sacrifice, like in the other two films in Rossellini's trilogy, and that plus a theme of a sort of helpless hope in human spirit, stays true through the seventy minutes of this film. Highly recommended (the language dubbing practically regardless).

... from UGC and director Roberto Rossellini. In the bombed out ruins of Germany's capital city, the Kohler family struggles to survive. The father (Ernst Pittschau) is sick and bedridden. Eldest son Karl-Heinz (Franz-Otto Kruger) is a former soldier in hiding from the police and unable to work. Daughter Eva (Ingetraud Hinze) goes out at night to try and skim what she can from the soldiers looking for companionship. Which leaves 12-year-old Edmund (Edmund Moeschke) to provide what food he can by working various menial jobs. He eventually falls in with petty criminals, and maybe worse, as the family's situation continues to deteriorate. Also featuring Erich Guhne, Jo Herbst, Christl Merker, and Hans Sangen.

Rossellini closes out his War Trilogy (after 1945's Rome Open City and 1946's Paisan) with this stark look at survival in a former war-zone. The actors are all non-professionals, and it shows, but one gets used to it, and Rossellini does a good job of keeping things within his performers' range. This is now the third film from 1948, following Berlin Express and A Foreign Affair, that I've watched recently that has been set in postwar Germany. Unlike those two, this one doesn't use the country as a backdrop for entertainment. Rather, this is an unflinching look into human misery and deprivation, and not for those looking for a good time. While I like the other two in Rossellini's trilogy more, this is still a very noteworthy, and recommended, film for those with the constitution for it.

This was on Criterion DVD, part of the Roberto Rossellini's War Trilogy box set, containing all 3 films. Each disc has loads of extras pertaining to that particular film, and the Germany Year Zero disc also has a feature-length documentary on Rossellini's life and career. Highly recommended to anyone with an interest in the man, his work, or international films of the mid-20th century.