Story Movie
The action unfolds in post-war Berlin, turned into ruins by World War II. Jake Geismar, an American war correspondent, is drawn into political games by his former lover Lena Brandt, whose missing husband becomes the object of a manhunt by both the American and Soviet armies. The situation escalates as Jake tries to uncover what Lena, desperate to escape Berlin with her husband, is hiding. She plans to use the contacts of Jake's personal driver, US Army soldier Tully, who has black market connections. Only there's no guarantee that they won't end up in an even bigger trap as a result...
Review 4K Movie
Observing myself and what is happening around me, I once discovered an amazing phenomenon - human evolution. No, not as a biological individual, but as an intelligent and sentient one. It is especially amazing when a person climbs over the fence of his infantile playground, which he persistently calls the world, and gets into the really real world (unfortunately it happens not always and a little late). There's as much good in this as bad, but at least it's honest and “mature”.
Steven Soderbergh's work is diverse and varied, both successful and not. But his duet with George Clooney is something special. He even with Pacino and Williams in “Insomnia” did not work out particularly well, but with Clooney it's a different matter. This is despite the fact that Clooney is not as rich in acting as the aforementioned cinematic pillars. And even though I'm not the one who can easily be accused of some illusory representation, I find a good evolution in their work that I can't help but admire. A filmography is a mirror of one's outlook, attitude to people, to life, and most importantly to oneself. Not wasting his resources in vain, trying to do something serious and meaningful in life, since 2005 were created and played 4 in something very similar movies, one of which was “The Good German”.
This tape was based on the eponymous and good novel by Joseph Canon. From the beginning of the movie underlying and then explicitly feel the visual parallel with “Casablanca”. True, it is external, because the film does not reveal you with the emotional power of “Casablanca”, but is primarily addressed to your mind, and the love line is somewhat displaced from the center of attention. The monochrome and recognizable scenes of “Casablanca” are no accident here. All this gives the movie a certain authenticity, honesty and frankness, which are inherent in “Casablanca” and other worthy military films. After all, if you strain and remember, a good portion of them are black-and-white or are at the dawn of truly color cinema, that is, are in close proximity to known events. The subject matter of this movie dictates the need for exactly the qualities described.
As a rule, the Second World War becomes the target of the movie camera and the director's intention either as a battle action or, more often, as a setting and environment for the fates of people, nations and for spy games. Here, however, the main themes are different. First, it is about politics, about big politics: through the eyes of an investigative journalist, we are introduced to the situation and behavior of the victorious and liberating states in post-war Germany, which, having not had time to finish one war, are already preparing for another. And it's not just historical hindsight. In the light of Soderbergh's works of recent years, this movie looks like a kind of flashback of US foreign policy. But besides that, once again, without unnecessary pathetics, the theme of the responsibility of man, people and nations for their actions and, equally, inactions is proposed. But whether it is possible and necessary to denature in a pure form from the whole rattling mixture of War only one, two themes, probably not. Besides, in my most sincere and naive mind, one should watch such a movie at least to inoculate oneself once again against the “brown plague”.
Yes, the movie is not for everyone - they may call it boring, undynamic, drawn out, incomprehensible in some places, and they will be right in their own way. But I am ready to find, and I find this movie professional, intelligent, honest and aesthetic. Yes, we are not given a finished product that is enough to just watch, you have to put some effort into it, as the director keeps you in constant mental tension, forcing you to mentally refer to world history and keep the details of the movie in your head. Watching it goes beyond the screen, in the sense that the habit of learning history and life from movies will not go away here, this “German” is only a “good” reason to do so. Pleasant to the eye and thorough aesthetics of the tape - it's a pleasure to look at (yes, yes, exactly look at) the unusually expressive and extremely interesting face of Cate Blanchett in the mysterious twilight.
As for the acting, one should not expect any eccentricity or colorfulness from such a movie (it's black and white (that's a joke)), although it does feature Tobey Maguire. Truth be told, it's the most expressive acting job in the movie, albeit a short one. But let's be fair to the other participants - the role of a self-righteous schizoid prone to sadism and with pronounced signs of paranoia is naturally brighter than all the others. Perhaps the novel could have been better adapted, too. Many things are not immediately clear and you have to keep them in your head for the time being, which leaves the risk of being misunderstood and unaccounted for. But this is already some style of director-producer and a kind of way to keep and filter the viewer at the screen. Besides, I don't mind being taken and dragged through the movie, I'm ready to listen to questions and wait for answers, and in combination with the ideas and ideology of the movie, to forgive some rough edges and some lack of, excuse me, “raisin”.
For George Clooney and Steven Soderbergh, this was the third movie of this kind in two years (2005, 2006), with “Michael Clayton” still to come. After such a movie, one can conclude with a sense of satisfaction that some filmmakers are willing and able to speak to the audience in an accessible language, without suggesting pretentiousness or sophistication of forms and plots, on serious topics as an adult, without falling into pathos, without moralizing, without amusing or entertaining you like a child. And may the evolution continue!
P.S. “The Good German” was a term used in occupied post-war Germany to describe Germans who had nothing to do with the regime's crimes, as it were, but simply lived and worked honestly. The plot-forming hero of the movie was a German, who was engaged only in the fact that with scientific precision calculated the necessary number of calories for the prisoners of the concentration camp Dora, also known as Nordhausen, so that they did not die like flies and before death could still bring benefit to the Great Germany. Was he guilty of anything, this good German?
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