Customer Reviews

Taking Sides [VHS]

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This film, which concerns the behavior of the great conductor Willem Furtwangler under Hitler's regime, is only secondarily about whether Furtwangler did or did not sympathize with the Nazis. The underlying subject is the relationship between art (specifically, music) and morality: should a great artist be expected to abandon his country in order to make a moral choice? or is his duty to keep art alive in society even if it means tolerating evil to do it? And if he chooses the latter course, how can we distinguish this from craven self-interest or even complicity? These are the questions posed to the characters and to us as viewers. A terrific and unusual film, but it will bother you if you are uncomfortable with the ambiguity at its center.

I saw the play in N.Y. before I saw the movie. The late Raymond Massey Jr. played Furtwangler in the play version. With all due respect to Massey, there is no comparison to the Swedish actor Stellan Skarsgard. Skarsgard is the great Furtwangler! Am I a self-proclaimed authority on the conductor? No, not really, but I have read the three existing biographies about him. I tell you that Skarsgard, without a doubt, is as close to the conductor as possible. His portrayal is worth seeing the film alone! Harvey Keitel as the interogator, WHOA! Although there are several other fine actors in this film, Skarsgard and Keitel make seeing this film a must. If your a classical music buff, what are you waiting for? The central issue of this film was, did Furtwangler offer his artistic talents to the government and thus deemed a colaborator? Or, did he simply have a love for Germany and his art to the extent he felt he needed to stay in Germany as a symbol of his and other German citizens opposition to the Nazis. Although at times he made compromises with the government, as a whole he was clearly anti- Nazi and was about to be arrested by the SS for his support of Jewish muscians just before he left the country for Switzerland. You may think I'm too sympathetic to Furtwangler, but after reading three books, I'm both a supporter of the man and his art. So,I highly recommend you see the movie and decide for your self. Lastly, while your watching this film you will probably feel that he should have left Germany a long time ago, if he really wanted to do the "right thing". However, let me tell you something most people do not know about Furtwangler. He was told by the government at one point that if he left Germany at any time, his elderly mother would be put in jail! My source is from a book written by Yehudi Menuhin's dad. Those of you who know classical music are familiar with the close relationship between the Menuhin family and Furtwangler. See the movie, there was no one like Furtwangler!

TAKING SIDES achieves what so many other attempts at exploring the extremes of the human psyche under duress do not. That nether land of doubt that exists when aftermath 'truths' can only be postulated and not proved is the fodder from which writer Ronald Harwood (who also wrote 'The Pianist') has created a terse and tense examination of the investigation by the Allied Forces of Conductor Wilhelm Furtwangler. Was he a Nazi sympathizer or a protector of Jews during the Holocaust? Director Istvan Szabo maintains the format of the original play to keep the story confined to the interrogation room, straying only momentarily to develop the characters of this quasi-trial. Stellan Skarsgard is extraordiarily fine as the controversial Furtwangler, even taking on his body language and conducting moments to the realist edge. As the Allied Forces interrogator Steven Arnold, Harvey Keitel is brilliant - seethingly angry, a hell-bent Major who refuses Furtwangler any semblance of respect. Assisting Keitel are his secretary Emmi (in an astonishingly fine performance by Birgitt Minichmayr) and an Allied observer David (the equally fine Moritz Bleibtreu), a Jew who still holds the subject Furtwangler in deep respect. But the magic is in the duets by Keitel and Skarsgard, sparring with personal venom and personal despair. We are not given a decision as to the truth of Furtwangler's investigation, but we are told the results of the interviews. All of the music is Beethoven and Schubert and Bruckner (the use of the Adagio from the Bruckner Symphony No. 7 is especially eloquent and meaningful) and is played from recordings by Furtwangler and the Berlin Philharmonic as well as by Daniel Barenboim and the Staatskapelle of Berlin. This film is every bit as fine as the author's film of his THE PIANIST, but for some unknown reason it simply opened and closed in the theaters without making the impact it so justly deserves. Highly recommended on every level.

Taking Sides starts with a superb scene. We are at a concert in Berlin as the great maestro Wilhelm Furtwangler conducts Beethoven's Fifth Symphony to a rapt audience. (Ironically, the piece was also a symbol of victory of the allies, with it's da-da-da-duum motto suggesting dot-dot-dot-dash--Morse Code for "V[ictory].") At the height of the drama, there's an air raid, spotlights start shining outside, and the lights in the hall eventually go out. It really happened. Both sides played Beethoven while bombs fell. Some recordings have even been preserved, and one can hear Wanda Landowska in London, for example, performing as bombs dropped around her.

Unfortunately, the rest of the movies doesn't live up to that great opening moment, or to another moment a short while later where a crowd of post-war music lovers sits in a bombed out cathedral, umbrellas raised, listening to Schubert in the rain. It's hard to give such a high-minded and ambitious film as "Taking Sides" a less-than-great evaluation (can you imagine sitting in a room and pitching this to a production company???), but "Taking Sides" disappoints and delights in almost equal measures. I have been wishing for years that someone would make a movie about classical music in this period in history and finally someone has. Unfortuantely, the budget on this was probably very very small, and it shows. But one doesn't have to necessarily have lots of bucks to make a great film. Still, the ability to film on more locations, better CGI effects (yes, this film has CGI effects in the form of bombed out buildings) and *a better editor* would have all helped things a bit. The editor on this picture was all thumbs, filling some scenes with inexplicably quick cutaway shots lasting fractions of a section, leaving other scenes to be one-shot monologues, even when you think it would be better to see a reaction, and inserting jump cuts awkwardly. We go from closeups to extreme long shots back to closeups without any rhyme or reason I can see (for a better example of how to handle this kind of shooting and editing, watch Patton), scenes are dropped carelessly in, with no thought to entrance or exit, and a whole subplot with a Russian officer who wants to trade "five conductors for my favorite Wilhelm Furtwangler" could have been reduced to one scene, or even left on the cutting room floor. It's so insignificant that I've been reading critics' reviews of the film on line all night, and not one has even mentioned it. It's five minutes of padding and just interrupts the main dramatic line.

Harvey Keitel plays his part with a little too much bluster from the getgo, so there's never a buildup. His one-note performance wears thin, and I'm not sure why they made the representative of one side of the argument a pig-headed ignoramus who in his way is as reprehensible as the Nazi barbarians he rails against. And the big moment at the end (I won't spoil it) regarding a recordng of the Adagio of the Bruckner 7th fell flat to me, because that seems to be one of the things you really *couldn't* fault Furtwangler for. And I would really like to know a little more about *how* Furtwangler saved some of his musicians from the death camps; having Keitel brush that away as besides the point was a cop-out on the film's part.

I kept waiting for the two minor characters, the secretary and the junior officer, to find something revelatory in that library search once they seemed to turn sides, but they never did. A lot of background information was tantilizingly hinted at, but that part of the story didn't feel fleshed out enough. I'm a subscriber to the Henry James theory of drama: if there's a gun on page one, by the end of the story it has to go off. To me there were some guns in this script that had their triggers cocked but were never fired. Pity. For example, early on, Furtwangler points out that other conductors who were far more implicated (Herbert von Karajan, for example) had already been cleared and were back to conducting. I would like to have known more about that--why and was there "politics" involved and who ultimately made these decisions. We could have seen Furtwangler's personal affects, what he had and what sort of "trunk" he was living out of. I would like to have learned more about how the post war conditions were affected Furtangler's life--his meager living situation and his reliance on the kindness of strangers--instead of just seeing him shuffle into the interrogation room every day.

But that's not to slight Stellan Skarsgard's performance, which is remarkable--while he didn't look much like Furtwangler and they didn't even try (too much hair!), I forgot all about that after five minutes, and thought about George C. Scott's comments about portraying General George Patton: what was important was not an exact resemblance but rather giving the *impression* of the man. Skarsgard certainly does that, based on the footage I've seen of Furtwangler, though the two definitely had different conducting styles!

Some have complained of the claustrophobia of the film, because it comes from a stageplay. I am more bothered by, as I said, strange choices of editing, never really letting us move around and breathe in the environment we're in. Remember that great scene in Chinatown where Jack Nicholson goes snoooing through the desk of the water commissioner early in the film? You learn a lot about the man and the time period in that scene. And as Jack explores LA, you breathe the air of the 1930s and feel like you're "living" there with the characters, and it's all done in an effortless way. This film could have used some of that, and a little less of Keitel and Skarsgard screaming over a desk.

The best moment may be saved for last. While Furtwangler never does convince Keitel's character of his sincerity--how could he?--and we are left wondering if perhaps Furtwangler's defense was more of an excuse than a defense, we cut to archival footage of the real Furtwangler at a concert. Nazi officers, including Joseph Goebbels, Heinrich Himmler and Hermann Goering, are present. After the event, Goebbles walks to the podium to shake Furtwangler's hand. (The movie talks a lot about a handshake with Hitler and seems to imply this is it, but in truth the famous photo is of Furtwangler *bowing* to Hitler as Hitler remains seated.) After touching the hand of the propaganda minister, Furtwangler discreetly does something that says more about his true feelings than all the fighting across a desk ever could.

The DVD image is sharp, and the sound is excellent. There are some talking head interviews about the production, and a puzzling six minute "Making of" short that has no narration, no structure, and very little sound, and just appears to be randomly strung-together bits of behind-the-scenes footage. It's totally pointless.

This is an ambitious film in which playwright and novelist, Ronald Harwood, adapts his own play of the same name for the silver screen. Having successfully written the screenplay for the film, "The Pianist", which was based upon the best-selling memoir by Wladyslaw Szpilman, Harwood is no less successful here. With the deft direction of renowned Hungarian director Istvan Szabo and the thespian efforts of its stellar cast, the film thematically explores a number of moral issues, though in the end, it leaves it to the viewer to resolve them.

The film explores the aftermath of the fall of Hitler's Third Reich through the investigation by Allied Forces of world famous German conductor Wilhelm Furtwangler (Stellan Skarsgard). This was part of an investigative effort to discover Nazi collaborators within Germany's artistic community in the belief that there had been collusion between politics and art for the sake of politics. It was also believed that by rooting out Nazi sympathizers and collaborators among its influential members that the Nazi ideology would die a natural death in Germany for lack of iconic leaders.

Wilhelm Furtwangler undergoes a series of interrogations by a Major Steve Arnold (Harvey Keitel), a narrow-minded American officer, who has been given orders by his superior officer to find this musical icon guilty of war crimes at any cost. Furtwangler is suspected by the Americans of having been an influential Nazi sympathizer who, through his music, renown, and virtuosity, swayed the German people to march to Hitler's tune through their love of music, so deeply imbedded in the German psyche.

Arnold, a claims examiner for an insurance company in his former civilian life, approaches his subject with all the disdain and disrespect he can muster. Thorough, yet loutish and seemingly culturally ignorant, the loud-mouthed Arnold is worlds apart from his targeted subject. Deeply affected by newsreels of the death camps in which millions were brutally killed, Arnold approaches Furtwangler as if the conductor had been an integral part of the final solution.

Arnold's German secretary, Emmi (Birgitt Minichmayr), whose father was executed by the Nazis for an aborted plot to assassinate Hitler, and another Allied Forces officer, Davis Wills (Moritz Bliebtreu), a secular German Jew whose own parents died in Hitler's camps, are present during Arnold's impassioned interrogation of Furtwangler. Arnold's examination of the
hapless Furtwangler sets the stage for the moral issues with which all the parties grapple and the viewer is left to ponder.

Harvey Keitel is excellent as the self-appointed avenging angel who sees things only in black and white absolutes. Birgitt Minichmayr is outstanding as the conflicted secretary, whose remembrance of her own interrogation at the hands of the Gestapo causes her to lose regard for Arnold. Moritz Bliebtreu is compelling as David Wills, who remembers Furtwangler as having been instrumental in inspiring his love of music and deplores the tenor of Arnold's interrogation. It is Stellan Skarsgard as Furtwangler, however, who steals the show. His sensitive and complex portrayal of the seemingly morally ambiguous Furtwangler is pure cinematic artistry.

Based upon true events, the film does not resolve the moral issues for the viewer. There is, however, a very telling vintage clip that follows at the conclusion of the film that shows the real Wilhelm Furtwangler with Adolf Hitler. What transpires is quite interesting and subject to interpretation. It is also consistent with the moral ambiguity of the film. One will have to decide for oneself what spin one cares to place on what one sees and decide which side of the moral divide one places Furtwangler, as well as oneself. All in all, this is a compelling and complex film. Bravo!

A fascinating study of the "de-nazification" of conductor Wilhelm Furtwangler (perhaps the most famous and respected musician of his time prior to World War II, and through much of the war as well, at least in the Third Reich) Furtwangler refused to do the Nazi salute and never actually joined the party, helped many Jewish musicians, and tried to get the music of the so called "entartete musik" (degenerate music, ultimately even music composed by Jews, such as Franz Schreker and Gustav Mahler. Problematic "philosophical" music by Paul Hindemith was also included.) Furtwangler was removed from his position as Music Director of the Berlin Philharmonic for trying to champion Hindemith's "Mathis der Maler". Furtwangler was never reticent to take the offense with party leaders, with the exception of Hitler himself. But he tacitly accepted the control of his programming, even though he was forbiddin to conduct music by Felix Mendelssohn or any composer with the "taint" of "Jewishness"!
This is an intriguing interpretation of Furtwangler's trying to be understood by a rabidly American anti-Nazi. There are more than 2 sides to Furtwangler's story. Herbert von Karajan HAD joined the Nazi Party twice, but he was de-Nazified far more quickly and was back on the podium well before Furtwangler. Can art be used to further evil intentions? Watch for the short historic footage at the film's ending, when Hitler shakes hands with Furtwangler. This film will have you asking more questions than are answered regarding the artist's responsibility and culpability when living in a plainly devilish machine. Google Furtwangler after you view this must-see cinematic question mark and see what you think. The parts are well played, and the story is spun out in a profound manner. But is it all this simple?
Order the film and try to put your self in each of the two protagonists moral positions. Nuf said.

I found this film about the pre-trial interrogation of Wilhelm Furtwaengler, conductor of the Berlin Philharmonic during the Third Reich, both disturbing and compelling. My discomfort arose from the one-sided nature of the interrogation, since Major Arnold (Harvey Keitel) has been given the mandate of securing a conviction against Furtwaengler by any means including humiliation. The Major is both a zealot and a bully who makes no effort to see the dilemma of the great maestro--whom he dismisses as a "bandleader,"--who has chosen to remain in Germany and has been forced to walk a "tightrope" in order to co-exist with and survive an intolerable regime. The Major, a philistine who has no understanding of the conflict between art and politics, furthermore, does not even speak the same language, figuratively speaking, as the shattered Furtwaengler. His interrogation methods, in fact, are recognized by Emmi, his jobbed-in German Secretary, as being reminiscent of those of the Gestapo.

The acting is superb, especially on the part of Stellan Skarsgard, whose nuanced portrayal of Furtwaengler is tremendously moving. Although Keitel's performance begins on such a high note that it has no place to go, it is nevertheless appropriate given the circumstances of his task of getting a conviction at any cost. Under director Istvan Szabo's guidance, however, the temptation to "take sides" with Furtwaengler, because of the Major's bullying, is subtly subverted by questions of conscience and motivation on the part of the maestro.

The recreation of post-war Berlin is superb. Two outstanding scenes take place at concerts: the first, of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony, at a baroque church in the last days of the war, as allied bombers drop their payloads on Berlin; and the second, of the adagio of the Schubert string quintet, at the ruins of the same church, which has been bombed out. In the middle of the performance of the latter, the rain pours in and the black umbrellas go up, and no one thinks of leaving. The choice of music is emblematic: Beethoven with it's beat ( . . . -) [ V for Victory, for those too young to remember] accompanies the defeat of the Third Reich, while the sublime Schubert adagio offers consolation to the Berliners who are left to live with the consequences of that demented regime.

One of the aspects of this film that I liked the best is that it asks difficult questions of the viewer, but provides no answers--perhaps because there are none.

Wilhelm Furtwängler was a great conductor who chose to stay in Germany and continue his work during the time of the Nazi regime. After the war there were trials for those who actually perpetrated crimes. There were also hearings to facilitate the so-called de-Nazification of Germany. Of course, after the, no one admitted to being a supporter of the Nazis let a lone a member of the party.

Furtwängler was investigated because of his prominence as the leader of the Berlin Philharmonic. He was eventually cleared and resumed his work. His record was ambiguous and remains so today. While he clearly helped Jews and risked much to protest the way Jewish musicians were being treated, he also made statements whose language can be taken as anti-Semitic. He was never invited to conduct in the United Sates after the war even though he was invited to take over the New York Philharmonic before the war.

This film is based on a successful play that uses these events as a background, but changes them for dramatic purposes. I note the actual history because it always comes up when discussing this play. This is not about the life of Wilhelm Furtwängler. It is about judging both guilt and judgment. Using the broad outline of Furtwängler's life it adds some fictional characters and invites to view to take sides. Is Furtwängler as shown in the play worthy of punishment? Should he be let go? In either case, why?

The actors in this movie are all good and the performances draw the viewer in and provoke strong reactions. Harvey Keitel plays the American official assigned to get Furtwängler (not to investigate the matter) in a very extreme way. I think this rabid approach may be done to balance the anger so many feel towards the Nazis. The idea of the play is not to push the viewer to one side or the other, but to provide enough information so that the viewer will feel conflicted on both sides. I think it does this very well and provides great material to spark discussion between friends or between parents and children. It can also be used in classes. I can imagine the passionate arguments the students will have going after this or that point in the film.

Take the play at face value and don't worry about the real person whose name and occupation they use. Think about what is put before you in the play and wrestle with it. Fascinating!

"Taking Sides" (2001) is a typical product from Istvan Szabo (Hungarian, born 1938), that means: it is a great movie.
Before the present film, Szabo has directed "Mephisto" (1981), "Colonel Redl" (1985) and "Hanussen" (1988); all excellent works, addressing the same eternal dilemma: to BE or not to BE.

Very skillfully Szabo never pass judgment on character's choices. He simply exposes the facts and let the viewer take sides.
In the four films I mentioned, he works with real life characters, or as in "Mephisto", clearly based on an existing person.

All the dramatic elements are displayed so the audience may decide. Yet deciding will not be easy. You will be forced to look deep into your own soul before you are able to say yay or nay.
I'll give some examples to show how Mr. Szabo performs this.
Ms. Straube's father was shot after he was involved in the plot to kill The German Dictator; yet as his daughter acknowledge he was a supporter of the Ruling Party until he realized that Germany was doomed and The German Dictator refuse to surrender.
Lt. Wills when trying to convince Ms. Straube to return to work with them, uses the argument "if you stick with us you may tame, somehow, Maj. Arnold"; basically the same justification to which Dr. Furtwangler resort to remain in Germany after the National Socialists take power.
Maj. Arnold resorts to an abject informer to harass Dr. Furtwangler as the German Secret Police has done formerly.
Col. Dymshitz (as Sazbo himself) is very aware as how come an intellectual to be pleased by elbowing those "party brass" and will, somehow, abdicate his principles.
Maj. Arnold wonders why if all German people states "we didn't know what they were doing to the Jews", then afterwards they were eager to show how they had aided some Jew to evade this or that issue.
Crowning every self indulging statement or auto-justification is this one: "Oh no, we weren't performing at the Ruling Party rally, it was the night BEFORE!"

There are other points of excellence of the film such as cinematography, in charge of Lajos Koltai, who had teamed with Szabo in the films I mentioned above and also in "Being Julia" (2004).
The pastel palette of the films' colors, the beautiful takes of the huge stairways of the "office", the lovely composition of the very few outdoors photograms and the sage illumination of every scene are outstanding.

Play acting is admirable: veteran Harvey Keitel with more than a hundred films gives one of his best performances, portraying Maj. Arnold, since his appearances in "Bugsy" (1991) or "The Piano" (1993). The same may be said of Stellan Skarsgard fleshing Dr.Furtwangler.

Well there you are, take a look to the film and with a hand over your heart decide what is right and what is wrong!
Film lovers will enjoy this capo lavoro!
Reviewed by Max Yofre.

Harvey Keitel's character, Major Steve Arnold is offensive in a way peculiar to the American entertainment machine. He fuels his investigation of a symphony conductor with emotion derived from repeated viewings of a bulldozer pushing the dead of Bergen-Belsen into a mass grave. Although it is a pre-trial inquiry, Arnold is convinced from the beginning of the guilt of the "defendant". Guilt of what? Not murder. Not Nazi party membership. Guilty of not leaving Germany in 1934 and continuing to work as a conductor. This, in Arnold's narrow mind, constitutes complicity.

The crowning outrage is the conductor's actual handshake with Adolph Hitler after a performance. For this Arnold berates him during endless interrogation sessions in his office, which makes up the bulk of the film. His voice quivering with rage, his vocabulary brimming with street punk vulgarity, he humiliates the conductor in a variety of ways until he feels he's "proven" his case.

One watches with a growing frustration as the hapless conductor tries to prove he is not a Nazi or anti-semite with feeble statements on art and the human spirit. No mention is made of the limited choices available in a totalitarian society. What, for example, was the conductor to do when the Fuhrer extended his hand to shake? Slap him in the face? Shake his hand only on condition the Fuhrer come backstage for a lecture on ethics? The major seems to have not the slightest inkling that the Nazis used piano wire for other things than making pretty music.

This is based on a true story, but I doubt very much anyone in the US Army conducted himself in this way with the conductor. This movie seems to grow more out of the Hollywoodish belief that if you work yourself into enough of a moral outrage and stamp your little foot loud enough, you can right retroactively all the wrongs of history.

It's unclear whether the writer/director actually sides with the shallow Arnold, or with his callow assitants, but he certainly gives the former the upper hand throughout the movie. When his stenographer, Fraulein Straube, resigns her post in revulsion over Arnold's Gestapo tactics, Arnold pulls her over to the movie projector to watch the Bergen-Belsen footage. One wishes she had some footage to show him, perhaps of skin falling off children with radiation sickness in the city of Hiroshima, or of mass graves operated by the major's "pals" in Siberia, pals with whom he not only shook hands, but had dinner and drank himself into a stupor with.