Customer Reviews

Jew Boy Levi

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I have seen Rodkin's work from film school and was very happy to hear of his feature, "Big Heart City." I was also happy to see how Andrews' character tries to make things right after a long absence. It's a great story and a must-see.

This is a well-acted, poignant film, though I'm not convinced that it is an authentic portrayal. It seems to say that the vulnerable country folk are manipulated by the intrusive Nazi menace, destroying the formerly pleasant relations they had with the Jew, Levi. But Germany, like most of Europe has a savage and repetitive history of anti-semitism that preceded the Nazis by hundreds of years. Ostracism and violence against Jews were not unusual, they were only more overt at some times than others. So, would Levi have felt so apparently confident in his dealings with the villagers? The director perhaps assumes that viewers will have a familiarity with European anti-semitism that most do not.

This is a fantastic film and fantastic writing. Everything is both simple and complicated at the same time. The story may seem straightforward, but the emotions take you on a wild roller-coaster ride. Everything makes sense at the end, but it's not a very pretty picture. This film shows how there are so many little, and big ways we indulge in hatred and violence. It's also tastefully shot and lays off heavily editing or techniques to drive home the point - something Hollywood could learn a lot from.

Like No Man's Land, Focus, Indochine, and Kippur; we get a real glimpse of the way that war creeps up on us and brings out the worst in people. Unlike the rash of sentimental crappy Hollywood soldier stories this one comes closer to what I would think the truth really is - that the lovely bonding that happens between soldiers is the ugly façade of the fact that civilians caught in war don't need it in order to bond together; they would bond together just fine without it.

This DVD, originally titled "Vieh-Jud Levi" in German, is good, but not great. The story is captivating, especially the romance that develops between Levi and a young farm girl. I was very disappointed in the stereotypical portrayal of Levi. In this respect the movie was more a propaganda film than a story about a Jewish man in the German countryside at the time of World War II.