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4.0 out of 5 stars
A moving story of guilt, redemption and hope; German expressionism and documentary realism, Nov 24 2006
"Report for December 24, 1942. Execution. 36 men, 54 women, 31 children, 347 rounds of ammunition"
It's now Berlin, a year after Germany surrendered. The city is little more than destroyed buildings and mountains of uncleared rubble. Susanne Wallner (Hildegarde Knef) has made her way to a crumbing apartment building where she lived before being sent to a concentration camp in 1943. She finds her apartment is now occupied by a man called Hans Mertens (Ernst Wilhelm Borchert). He's withdrawn, depressed, sardonic, and he refuses to leave. She finally says that she is moving in but that he can stay a few days until he finds other quarters. Mertens, it turns out, is a doctor who has lost all desire to do anything but drink. He had been a surgeon assigned to the Germany army in Poland. As he and Susanne tentatively develop feelings for each other, two things happen. He discovers the man who had been the captain of his unit in 1942 is now in Berlin, a happy and confident factory owner, father of two, and untroubled by any war experiences. Ferdinand Brueckner (Arno Paulsen) is a brisk little man with thinning hair, rimless glasses and a small mustache. He tells Mertens, "Every era offers its chances if you find them. Helmets from sauce pans or sauce pans from helmets. It's the same game." Mertens plans to shoot him.
Mertens also is called to help a young girl who is slowly suffocating. He reluctantly identifies himself as a doctor. He does not want to do anything, but knows the girl will die if he doesn't take emergency steps. He winds up realizing a new self-worth in his skills as a doctor. He and Susanne begin a much happier time together. Then Christmas Eve brings back all the memories of an atrocity he tried and failed to stop, and of the captain who gave the order to shoot dozens of hostages while he prepared a Christmas Eve celebration for his officers in a village in Poland. Mertens is determined this time to see that justice is done, and so be it if that means he must be a murderer, too. He finds Brueckner in Brueckner's darkened factory. The conclusion is tense but not without hope.
This sounds almost melodramatic. The Murderers Are Among Us, however, is anything but. The film was the first movie made in Germany after WWII. It's a sad, thoughtful reflection on the crimes Germany committed and on the need for some kind of accountability. Weaving through the sadness of Mertens, however, is the recognition of how important hope is. The movie, itself, is so well photographed and edited that it remains a gripping piece of work. The film was shot in Berlin and all the bombed-out buildings, the rubble and the sight of Berliners struggling to live is real. Director Wolfgang Staudte brings an effective mixture of expressionism and documentary realism to the film. He creates some wonderful scenes of angled stairways, broken windows, low, upward shots and harsh shadows.
And a word about Hildegarde Knef. She has always been one of my favorite actresses. She was an attractive woman but no Hollywood starlet type. She had a long face, a strong mouth, intelligent eyes with a mind you could see working. When she came to La La Land and Hollywood couldn't figure out what to do with her, she shrugged and immediately headed back to Europe, where she became an international star. She had a great success later on Broadway as Ninotchka in Cole Porter's Silk Stockings. She's one of the best reasons for watching The Lost Continent. (Eric Porter is the other.)
The DVD transfer has the quality of a good VHS tape. The audio is almost as good. Considering the environment of the story, this is not a serious drawback. There are two worthwhile extras. The first is a biography of Staudte, the other gives background on how the film came to be made.
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5.0 out of 5 stars
Dark future in post-war Germany..., Jan 1 2004
Susanne Wallner is a survivor of the Concentration Camps of World War II. When she returns to her apartment she finds it in ruins as the rest of Berlin. She also discovers that her apartment has a new tenant, Dr. Hans Mertens, who spends his time in the local club where he continuously gets drunk in order to deepen the shadows over his memories of the war. Susanne finds out that Dr. Mertens refuses to move out, which leads to Susanne and him sharing her apartment. The two new roommates become involved in an entangled relationship where Susanne shows strong feelings and deep sympathy for Dr. Mertens despite her own hardships after the war. However, Dr. Mertens own ghosts from the war seem next to impossible to exorcise, and when Susanne finds a letter that Dr. Mertens was suppose to deliver for a fallen comrade the tension between the two roommates becomes more tense. This leads Dr. Mertens back into his past and into a dark secret that Dr. Mertens is carrying within himself. Murderer Are Among Us was the first film made in Germany after World War II that displays the true dark future that was laying ahead of a German nation in ruins after the war and the ambiguous nature of the people in a healing nation. In historical perspective, this film delivers a tremendously strong message, which even today should be pondered and mused. In addition, this ingenious story grabs the audience in a choke hold that never lets go until the end, and when it loosens its tight grip of the audience it leaves them with an imprint that will not leave them for a long time.
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4.0 out of 5 stars
Not everyone "followed orders" in Nazi Germany, May 2 2003
This powerful piece of Historic Fiction shows a realistic look at Post-WWII Germany, and the determination of the shook-up nation to pick up the pieces and survive their darkest chapter in modern history.Many gripping moments include the "return" of a young woman (played by a very young Hildegard Knef) who had spent years in Nazi concentration camps. Her innocence and purity are reflected in the woman's complete willingness to "forgive and forget" the attrocities witnessed and experienced. A main character was a commanding officer responsible for horrible acts against innocent civilians, while another had refused to take part in such evil. The final scenes "drive home" the message how some feel no remorse for their evil deeds, while others remain plagued with the images of those mercilessly tortured and murdered. Seeing the young woman who had been victimized by the evil regime step in to prevent a altercation between the man she loves and the man responsible for much of the suffering shows that humans are capable of forgiving and thus surviving into a better life, free of hate and vengeance. I highly recommend the original German version with or without the subtitles. Many of the effects require the original sound track. This would be a valuable teaching tool for an advanced German class, or a related European History lesson...
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