Phoenix (2014)
Country: GER/POL
Technical: col/2.39:1 98m
Director: Christian Petzold
Cast: Nina Hoss, Ronald Zehrfeld, Nina Kunzendorf
Synopsis:
Liberated from the camps after the war, a Jewish former singer has reconstructive surgery for a facial bullet wound. Still in love with her husband who she is told betrayed her to the Gestapo, she permits him to recruit her in a scam through which she will impersonate herself and together they will come into possession of her unclaimed riches.
Review:
Taking as its anthem the jazz classic 'Speak Low', this slow-burn, low-budget masterpiece channels Hitchcock's Vertigo in having a man remake the image of his wife, only to be incapacitated when artifice turns into reality. The story functions according to three conflicting mind-sets: that of the friend who cannot forgive society's betrayal of her kind; that of the wife who only wants her husband back, but not perhaps at any cost; and the husband's, whose guilt blinds him to the truth others see instantly.
Country: GER/POL
Technical: col/2.39:1 98m
Director: Christian Petzold
Cast: Nina Hoss, Ronald Zehrfeld, Nina Kunzendorf
Synopsis:
Liberated from the camps after the war, a Jewish former singer has reconstructive surgery for a facial bullet wound. Still in love with her husband who she is told betrayed her to the Gestapo, she permits him to recruit her in a scam through which she will impersonate herself and together they will come into possession of her unclaimed riches.
Review:
Taking as its anthem the jazz classic 'Speak Low', this slow-burn, low-budget masterpiece channels Hitchcock's Vertigo in having a man remake the image of his wife, only to be incapacitated when artifice turns into reality. The story functions according to three conflicting mind-sets: that of the friend who cannot forgive society's betrayal of her kind; that of the wife who only wants her husband back, but not perhaps at any cost; and the husband's, whose guilt blinds him to the truth others see instantly.
Country: GER/POL
Technical: col/2.39:1 98m
Director: Christian Petzold
Cast: Nina Hoss, Ronald Zehrfeld, Nina Kunzendorf
Synopsis:
Liberated from the camps after the war, a Jewish former singer has reconstructive surgery for a facial bullet wound. Still in love with her husband who she is told betrayed her to the Gestapo, she permits him to recruit her in a scam through which she will impersonate herself and together they will come into possession of her unclaimed riches.
Review:
Taking as its anthem the jazz classic 'Speak Low', this slow-burn, low-budget masterpiece channels Hitchcock's Vertigo in having a man remake the image of his wife, only to be incapacitated when artifice turns into reality. The story functions according to three conflicting mind-sets: that of the friend who cannot forgive society's betrayal of her kind; that of the wife who only wants her husband back, but not perhaps at any cost; and the husband's, whose guilt blinds him to the truth others see instantly.