Customer Reviews

Rosenstrasse

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Three women, from different generations are still trying to heal from the horrors of the Third Reich and WWII more than fifty years after Germany surrendered to the Allied forces on May 7, 1945. The film's primary focus, however, is on a little girl who lost two mothers in a three year period - 1943 to 1946. She never received explanations for the horrors she lived through, nor did she have the opportunity to understand or express her pain. "Rosenstrasse" is set in 21st century New York City and Berlin, with flashbacks to Nazi Germany and Berlin in 1943.

When Ruth Weinstein's, (Jutta Lampe), husband dies, she insists that the family observe a strictly Orthodox mourning period, even though they had never been observant Jews. Her son and daughter are both bewildered, and then angry, when Ruth forbids daughter Hannah, (Maria Schrader) to marry her Nicaraguan fiance Luis, ((Fedja van Huet). Luis is not Jewish, and although he was mentored by Hannah's now deceased father, and religion had never been a problem before, their plans for a life together are now up in the air. A distant cousin alludes that the source of Ruth's problems lies in the past, in Nazi Germany. She reveals to Hannah that her mother was cared for, in fact saved from certain death, by an Aryan woman during WWII. After the war Ruth immigrated to America to live with this cousin and her family, virtual strangers. Ruth had never discussed her childhood or her war experiences with her children. She always kept silent. And when Hannah probes once more she receives no answers, as always. She decides to fly to Germany to uncover the secrets of her mother's past.

In Berlin, Hannah tracks down 90 year-old Lena Fischer, (Doris Schade), the Christian woman who brought seven year-old Ruth home to live with her, when the child's mother was imprisoned with other Berlin Jews in March, 1943. Hannah does not reveal her identity, but says she is conducting a study about Aryans and their Jewish spouses during the war. She listens intently, over a period of days, as the charming elderly woman finally reveals the facts about her own life and Ruth's, both so closely intertwined.

Thousands of Berlin's Jews were swept up from their forced labor jobs and taken to Rosenstrasse 2-4, in central Berlin in March 1943. This was meant to be the capital's final round-up for the Final Solution, and the Jews were to be deported to concentration camps from Rosenstrasse. Ruth's mother was one of these unfortunate people. Left alone without a ration card, the child would not have survived without Lena's assistance. (The younger Lena is played by Katja Riemann, who gives a powerful performance). Her husband, Fabian Fischer (Martin Feifel), a brilliant violinist, was also taken to Rosenstrasse. Lena was a concert pianist and met Fabian through their mutual love for music. She married against her aristocratic parents wishes and was disowned by all, except her brother Arthur. As with most marriages between Aryans and Jews, the Aryans were pressured heavily by the Nazi State, their employers, and usually friends and family to divorce their Jewish spouses. Most who refused were marginalized, but they still maintained their status as Aryans and German citizens, and as such their Jewish mates were supposedly protected from deportation.

Lena joins a group of women waiting for word of their husbands, keeping vigil, outside the building on Rosenstrasse. It is here that Lena meets the frightened and bewildered Ruth, who knows her mother is in the building, but never is actually told that she has been deported already. Svea Lohde plays Ruth, as a young girl, with great sensitivity. She has nowhere to go and no one to turn to, so Lena steps in, in spite of her fear of discovery for hiding a Jewish child. Lena and Ruth form a strong bond, a surrogate mother-daughter relationship which will last for three years. Director Margarethe von Trotta emphasizes throughout Ruth's heartbreaking ignorance of her mother's fate. The number of women on Rosenstrasse increases. Unarmed, unorganized, and leaderless, these courageous women, some with their children, stood up to the Nazis and demanded the return of their loved ones.

The acting and the Rosenstrasse storyline are excellent, however Director von Trotta combines so many intense plots, involving so many people, that the points she most wants to make occasionally become lost in the confusion. We never hear Ruth speak of closure, if in fact she does ever come to grips with her past. The film's conclusion only hints at this. Almost all of her dramatic story is revealed by Lena, who has only second-hand knowledge of the events and no real idea of the child's feelings at the time. Von Trotta's handling of the character study is far too abstract. She is much more successful when portraying the women of Rosenstrasse and their protests and resistance. I must credit her with navigating an intensely emotional story effectively, without falling into sensationalism or melodrama.

This is a little known true story of women, who in spite of loss, separation and fear for their loved ones, found the courage to fight back against a brutal Nazi state. I am glad it has finally been brought to the screen.
JANA

This film is based upon the true story of the German women who, during Word War II, protested the internment of their Jewish husbands in a building located on Rosenstrasse, a street in Berlin. These were women who defied the Nazi status quo by remaining married to the husbands whom they loved so dearly, although it came with a price.

The film tells the story through the juxtaposition of the present and the past. The story is told in flashback. In the present, the viewer is introduced to Ruth Weinstein (Jutta Lampe), a secular Jewish woman, living in present day New York, She has just lost her husband, and appears to have lost her senses, as well. She insists that her family sit Shiva, speaking only German while observing Orthodox traditions. She refuses to acknowledge her first cousin, who has come to pay her respects. Ruth also refuses to acknowledge Luis Marquez (Fedja van Huet), her only daughter's Nicaraguan, non-Jewish fiance. Luis had been a protoge of the deceased, who had had no issue with the idea of Luis marrying his daughter. Ruth now forbids her daughter to marry Luis or she will disown her. Hannah (Maria Schrader), the daughter, is at a loss to account for her mother's seemingly irrational behavior and is totally appalled by it.

When Hannah speaks to her mother's first cousin, whom she had never before met, she discovers that her mother had lived with her first cousin and her family when she first came to the United States from Germany. Hannah comes away thinking that the answer to her mother's apparent derangement lies in Berlin, with an Aryan woman Hannah does not even know is still alive. This woman had, apparently, saved Ruth's life during the Nazi's reign of terror. This was news to Hannah, as she knew virtually nothing of her mother's past, as Ruth had never spoken to her about it. When her mother insists on remaining uncommunicative on the issue, Hannah decides that for all their sakes, she needs to get some answers. So, she goes off to Germany to seek in the past the answers that she cannot get in the present.

Fortunately for her, she discovers that the woman for which she is looking is, indeed, alive, although quite elderly. She contacts the woman, ninety year old Lena Fischer (Doris Schade), telling her that she is doing research on the issue of Aryans and their Jewish spouses during World War II. Ms. Fischer agrees to see her, and during their session the story of her mother unfolds in flashback, In Berlin of 1943, many Jews married to Aryans were swept up by the Nazis and taken to a building on Rosenstrasse to await a determination of their fate. Virtual prisoners, their spouses and children were unable to communicate with them. Ruth's mother, Miriam Sussman (Lena Stolze), was one of these Jews. Her daughter, eight year old Ruth Sussman (Svea Lohde), had escaped her mother's fate, as she had obeyed her mother's instructions when the Nazis paid the Sussman home a visit. Unfortunately for Ruth's mother, the Nazis discovered that her Aryan husband had divorced her two years prior, thereby sealing her fate, and she, unknown to Ruth, is transported East. One can well imagine what happened to her.

At the same time, Fabian Israel Fischer (Martin Feifel) is also swept up from the factory where he works and taken to the building on Rosenstrasse. Fortunately for him, his wife, thirty-three year old Lena Fischer (Katja Riemann), is an Aryan devoted to her husband. Both are musicians. She is a concert pianist, and he is a violinist. They met before the war, bonding through their music. Although he is Jewish, and she is a member of a noble Aryan family, the von Eschenbachs, they married. Her father, however, disowned her for marrying Fischer. Her mother was sympathetic but under her father's thumb. Her brother, Arthur (Jurgen Vogel), however, remained loyal to his sister and friendly with his brother-in-law. With the rise of the Nazis, life for the Fischers changed. They were forced to live in reduced circumstances, giving up the music that they loved. Instead, Fabian was made to work in a factory from which he was taken peremptorily to the building on Rosenstrasse.

Lena sought the help of her brother, Arthur, now a soldier in the German army. He is sympathetic and tries to get Fabian released to no avail. Lena herself tried, but was looked down upon as little more than a whore for having married a Jew whom she now refuses to divorce. Instead, she stood vigil for her husband, Fabian, with the other Aryan women on Rosenstrasse, and it was there that she met Ruth Sussman. Ruth attached herself to Lena, and Lena assumed responsibility for the child. Without Lena, Ruth would never have survived. Lena takes care of Ruth for three years, forming a mother-daughter bond. After the war, Ruth's aunt, her mother's sister, claimed Ruth, and Lena was forced to send Ruth to join her aunt in America. Ruth never knew what happened to her mother, Miriam, and never understood why Lena, her surrogate mother, gave her up to go and live with total strangers. It is Ruth's ignorance of the situation that lies at the heart of her dysfunction.

What happens to them all during the war and the impact that the Nazis were to have on all their lives makes for a well told tale. The film offers a very balanced view of ordinary Germans in war time, telling a story not generally known. Under the deft direction of Margarethe von Trotta, the performances in this film are phenomenal, and the film has won many awards. Katja Riemann won the Best Actress Award at the 2003 Venice Film Festival. It won the David Di Donatello Award in 2004 for Best European Film. At the Bavarian Film Awards in 2004, it won for Best Cinematography. This is a powerful and compelling film that is totally riveting. Bravo!

I saw this movie in a N.Y. movie house. It was superb! The acting was outstanding! These courageous German women impressed me deeply. I have read and seen a number of films about Germans who challenged the Nazis,and although it was too bad there wasn't more of it, some sacrificed a great deal. The film suggests the main character's relationship to Goebbels was influential to the release of the Jewish spouses being held by the Nazis. I don't beleive this was fact however, I am still personally researching the matter. In addition to opposing the Nazis, she also protects a young Jewish girl. There are numerous flashbacks and there is plenty of intense drama. I have heard of many women who have fought for many issues held dear to them, but these women battled against some horrific odds. Although the movie is in German(English Sub-titles) don't let it stop you from getting a copy of this movie. I wish American actresses could give such performances. A must see!

It has been pretty easy to make films about the genocide and murder of German nazism where the suffering and the pity of the victims is the main thing to touch our hearts, where the fear of the oppressor, or even in the lamentable example of Schindler is treat as a hero, even though he was just a good murderer of Jews who saved a few.

The Rosenstrasse tells the real story of German women married to Jews who fought back against the imprisonment and threatened deportation to the death camps of their Jewish husbands. The demonstrated in the Rosenstrasse, the street in front of what become the prison of Jews about to be deported, and confronted the police and Gestapo. They did not back down, and threatened with bullets and bayonets, they actually won. Their men were released. This happened in Berlin in 1943, not just on the screen.

The brilliance of the director and author is to set this story in the personal discovery of a young twenty-something New York yuppie whose mother as a child escaped from the Rosenstrasse prison, who was protected and saved from the camps by one of the non-Jewish Germans at the Roenstrasse. The story is intelligently set in the real struggle we all go through with our children, with our parents to find new identities, often realizing what the old identities actually were.

The acting here is good to superb. You are facing real gritty people with defects and errors, charms and evil, just like people you know. You see Nazi Germany not as some stereotype, but as a world like one we will recognize.

I wont disclose more of the plot which is well built, well developed and sinks into you. I will only disclose that this movie is a good example of how fighters can get what they want. The example of the women of the Rosenstrasse who really lived and are potrayed here will inspire other fighters.

They inspire not pity, not horror at the power of fascism evil, but respect for the power of people who fight back.

I strongly recommend "Rosenstraße" for fans of films in the tradition of "Schindler's List", "Shoah", "The Pianist", "Stalingrad", and "Enemy at the Gates". The production values of 1943 Berlin are stunning. What is more, this is a docudrama based on a real event--women's resistance against the government in the middle of a war. Some might even argue this occurred when the outcome of the war was clear militarily.

The opening scene really defines the film well, as "Ruth" aka "Helga" is preparing to "sit Shiva" for her departed husband in modern-day New York City. She informs family members of what must be done (many things are difficult to do in today's electrically-fortified urban life)-- apparently as if they knew nothing of this important tradition. The stage is set for inter- and intra-familial confusion. The filming of modern Berlin is excellent. I think more could have been done with that aspect of the film, having been to Berlin a number of times since 2003. For example, the widow whom Hannah (Ruth's daughter) comes to visit is a very typical pensioner's apartment in an old building with no "lift" (elevator). Just HOW typical this scene and some of the others shot in modern Berlin could have been capitalized upon. Berlin is a great city of contrasts, both in time, ambience, and their effects on the human psyche. Unlike other reviewers, what I reveal of the plot will not, I hope, impair the viewer's appreciation of this great film.

However, the "full-blooded" German women with Jewish husbands were initially subject to a "privileged" (as long as there were no children) status under the 1935 Nürnberg Laws "for the Protection of German Blood and Honor". In other words, the goal of the Reich being the elimination of "Jewish Blood" from Europe, these marriages were tolerated only as long as they remained without issue and below the horizon. There is one scene in which an SS officer makes clear that the 1935 Nürnberg Laws defining different types of "mixed marriages" and "ancestry" were "not for the protection of Jews!" However, when the Gestapo began to harass the Jewish males and keep them in a prison within the city limits, on the Rosenstraße, the situation became for the women intolerable.

They faced the regime with public demonstrations, even standing down when confronted with armed SS soldiers who appear prepared to mow the crowd down with machine guns. The main protagonist of the film, a modern woman in search of her ancestry, stumbles across the Rosenstraße incident and finds that, despite her mother's silence, her family was deeply involved in one of the most significant resistance demonstrations during the Third Reich by way of her mother and her Aryan "protector." These women successfully fought against the deportation of their Jewish husbands, acts of great courage and moral strength. I say successfully, in the sense that they were not killed, evacuated, or apparently subject to any particular recriminations by a state-sanctioned organisation well-known for reprisals. The protector's brother, who shares a Baron and Baroness as parents, returns from Stalingrad without one leg, has seen the mass killings of Jews. Of this, at some risk, he is not silent. As a Lieutenant Colonel (by his shoulder boards) in uniform with the Iron Cross First Class with Oak Leaf Cluster around his neck, one sees just how much respect the garners him. It is distinctly Prussian/German.

This film, appearing shortly before the 60th anniversary of the end of the war, is therefore significant, and accurate to the minutest detail of soundstaging, costuming, and creation of the backdrop of wartime Berlin under air attack. This film, in this reviewers opinion, rises to the level of a burgeoning (there may now be upwards of 10) films showing the human struggle in the face of world conflagration, and known incidents of resistance to Nazi tyranny on a significant scale. There are plenty of characters for the viewer to enter the film through identification, from children to the aged...and watching it is bound to move anyone with a human heart. Upon re-viewing this film in 2011, I still give it 5 stars--and more.

There are many tales of unsung heroes who defied authority and pushed the envelope of bravery in the time of war. ROSENSTRASSE is an elegant, brutally realistic homage to the Aryan wives of Jewish husbands who had the courage to not take the easy way out to survive during the ethnic cleansing that violated all sense of decency and humanity perpetrated by the Nazis. The simple solution to deny association with the Jews would have been to obtain a divorce, a simple bit of paperwork that would have prevented German women the agony of fear associated with the gradual deportation and extermination of their German husbands. Instead these women braved harassment, fear, winter, and soldiers to stay in front of a detention center in Berlin, pleading for their husbands' releases.

The film begins in contemporary America with a stern woman arranging a Shiva for her dead husband. This woman had never been committed to Jewish Orthodox religion until this dramatic turn in her life. Her children (adults, one daughter Hannah in love with a non-Jew whose incipient marriage had the blessing of the departed man) cannot understand why suddenly they must converse in German and sit Shiva for the allotted time. The family strife drives Hannah to Berlin where she encounters the Aryan woman responsible for the support of the 'wives of Rosenstrasse', a pianist whose violinist husband was spared the extermination, and who had guarded the mother of Hannah from Nazi discovery. Hannah grows to understand the impact on her mother of the atrocities she had lived through and is able to return to America an enriched person.

The plot seems bland as outlined, but the impact is gained through the flashback scenes of the time in 1943 when the Rosenstrasse vigil took place. This German film shows both sides of the history and seems to relate a more balanced image of what Berlin was like at that time: there were sympathetic guards and non-Jews who did what little they could do to spare the tragedy of the Nazi mindset to some of the Jews under their jurisdiction.

The acting is first class, the music (a Violin and Piano work by Cesar Franck) underlies the sensitivity of the women, and while the movie could use some judicious editing to shorten the film, the impact is powerful. In German with English subtitles. Grady Harp, January 2005

I am a major fan of films that concern WW2 and especially the Holocaust and related topics.

ROSENSTRASSE is a film that,at its heart,concerns itself with the seven days in March 1943 in which Aryan women stood outside a building in Berlin in which their Jewish husbands were being held before their translation to the Auschwitz Camp. Hitherto, Jewish men's lives were "protected" under Nazi law by their marriage to Aryan women by having to work in German Armament Factories.This is a true story and worthy of complete attention. However, the director and screenplay writer have chosen to tell this story in a very confusing way involving way to many extraneous story lines and characters thus robbing it of its complete force. The narrative is non-linear and involves so many flashbacks and flash forwards in different people's lives that it is difficult to keep up with the various stories (especially reading subtitles).The DVD contains NO extras, which could have been very beneficial to aid in understanding this film better,especially as to why the director chose to dilute and confuse what could have been a much better and more focused film.For the price, I would not recommend purchasing this DVD unless you get it for under $4.00.It is worth only a rental at best.

Having read about the Rosenstrasse miracle in various books I rejoiced when somebody chose to make a movie about it. I eventually managed to get a copy.

It is an incident unique in the story of the Holocaust. Fanatical nazis in Berlin of all places were forced to return Jews they wished to deport to the Death Camps. It happened when they seized mixed marriage Jews as part of the Berlin Round up. And much to their astonishment, their German spouses showed up outside the place they were kept demanding their release.

Much to everybody's astonishment, they got it shortly aferwards.

This is their story.

I must confess I thought the New York scenes where the main character starts by meeting a relative her mother doesn't tell her about were rather flat and two dimensional. The modern German scenes weren't that bad but the scenes set during WWII Berlin were superb. Great costuming. Great scene organization and set design. Nice drama. Good character portrayal. A happy ending, something unique for Holocost films.

Overall, this is a great film.

The structure of the movie reminded me of "Eleni", a weaving of the past and present as a child goes back to investigate the horrors that were the parent's past. Starts slowly but settles into a pace that can be truly savored. This is a movie that I will find myself revisiting again and again.

For me, this movie is very different than other Holocaust movies, in that it explores the issue of what happened to Jewish spouses of Aryan women...the story itself is based on a true occurrence, and the movie begins with a wake...the widow is tormented by visions of her past in wartime Berlin & shows disapproval at her daughter's choice of a non-Jewish fiance...the daughter then discovers there is more to her mother's past than she was ever told, and travels to Germany to discover her mother's past...the story is told in flashbacks through reminiscences, and basically focusses on the plight of Aryan women in Berlin whose Jewish husbands have been confined in a place called Rosenstrasse...I won't give too much away, but I must say that for a slow-paced movie, it is quite gripping as we are kept guessing as to the final fate of the Jewish spouses...as for the acting, the characters from the past did an excellent job, their performances were very realistic, and heart-wrenching, especially the actress who plays the main role of Mrs Fabian Fischer, the Aryan wife. In the present day, the actress who plays the daughter who seeks to unearth her mother's past wasn't very convincing, but all in all the story itself makes up for other lacks in the movie, and it is definitely watchable for the unique plot.