Customer Reviews

Max

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Perhaps I was watching a different version of the MAX that's gleaned such glowing reviews. I disagree with most of them adamantly. With exception of FIRST CIRCLE post-WW I ambience of Germany which Director Meyjes effectively evokes;and typically fine acting of John Cusack as Max Rothman,I found this "border-line" art film about ART & EVIL very disappointing.In my estimate, Noah Taylor's portrayal of Hitler as aspiring artist was shrill and repugnant,approaching parody.There is nothing charismatic or remotely fascinating in his one note characterization of the man Lucifer himself might yield to. From the jump, Hitler is portrayed as frustrated punk with illusions of grandeur and delusions of talent.[The scene in the hovel/attic where he attempts to paint, and realizes he has no artistic ability is POWERFUL.] Even scenes where Hitler's once-and-future Nazi mentors recognize his--historically undeniable--warped Preacher's "grace" as orator are unconvincing because all Taylor does(like many of today's talentless RAPPERS)is fume and scream.

MAX had possiblity for being an unforgettable political HORROR film; perhaps cult classic. Its failure is magnified. Ambience, theme and Cusack cannot save a cliched effort in PM murk. Director Meyjes utterly misses this "incarnation" of Hitler.His man claims to aspire to construct classic BEAUTY. In resentment and unparalleled egotism, he determines to DECONSTRUCT an entire world order; murder millions; and poison human desire for the Good,True & Beautiful: SOMETHING WICKED,indeed,THIS WAY COMES. Meyjes and Noah Taylor,ultimately, do genesis of Evil disservice by displaying it as teeth-grinding PETULANCE without seductive glamour or potential for perverse triumph. MAX'Hitler is a fool. History records he was sheer TERROR.(2 & 1/2 stars)

A standard question concerning ethics asks if you could go back in a time machine and have the chance to kill Adolf Hitler as a baby, would you do it? Another "what if?" concerning Hitler has to do with his attempts to be an artist. Hitler's artwork is rather cold and uninspiring, but it seems reasonable to speculate that if he had been a better artist he would not have turned to politics and the 20th century would have been completely different.

Writer-director Menno Meyjes explores this idea in the 2002 film "Max," in which Adolf Hitler (Noah Taylor) is still living in military barracks in Munich as Germany signed the Treaty of Versailles and is trying to make a name as an artist. He shows his work to Max Rothman (John Cusack), a Jewish art dealer who lost an arm in the World War and who is consumed by the idea of the subversiveness of modern art. Hitler disparages such ideas, considering them "blood poisoning." Rothman and Hitler argue about art, both in terms of the futurist movement and Hitler's lack of an "authentic voice" in his own work.

Meanwhile, at the barracks of the decommissioned army, Hitler is folding laundry and being courted by Captain Mayr (Ulrich Thomsen), who is teaching a class on propaganda. Mayr is a historic figure and it is in his responses to Mayr and others in the barracks that Hitler is his most articulate and persuasive in dispensing his particular brand of venom.

The major fault I find in this film is that both the script and Taylor's performance play too quickly to the ranting Hitler. One of the great distortions of Hitler's legacy is that the black & white film footage of Hitler speaking comes from the climax of his speeches, when he has worked himself and his audience into frenzy. But Hitler always built to such a crescendo. He would show up late for speeches, making his audience wait in anticipation, and then stand there until the audience got quiet, and then would stand some more, building the drama. Then he would begin speaking softly, so that his audience strained to hear him. Hitler was a devastatingly effective public speaker and every time his oratory is reduced to rants and raves we have an incomplete and inadequate understanding of the monster.

What lies at the heart of the film is the idea that you either take the view that Hitler is a madman born in sulfur who wrecked havoc on the world or that he was a kind of hustler. Meyjes goes with the later view, presenting Hitler as a frustrated artist whose evil was rooted in that frustration and his inability to express himself. It is in his engagements with Rothman and Mayr that Hitler finds his "authentic voice," and comes to the fatal conclusion that politics will be his art and the German people his canvas.

"Max" ends the relationship between Rothman and Hitler on an ironic note, which is exactly what I expected. After all, by both his failure and his success with Hitler, Rothman is pushing Hitler towards the horrors of Nazi Germany, and his fate in the film symbolisms what is to come. Meyjes is not trying to tell a true story here; after all, Hitler had a handlebar mustache during this period after the war, but having Taylor play the future Fuhrer clean-shaven seems appropriate for this provocative story.

Of course this film is provocative; it should be. Reducing Hitler and the Nazis to being anti-Semitism misses the whole fascist dynamic of the struggle towards order that became the Cold War mentality. Meyjes takes the rather simplistic idea that if someone like Rothman had been a better patron to Hitler the artist that everything would have been different. But the script is so intelligent and the performances so compelling for the most part that we are willing to think along these lines at look at Hitler in a new light. This does not mean that we see him as being a better person, but rather than we better see him for what he was by considering how he became that way.

This enigmatic film title "Max" can be switched into "Adolf When He Was Young." The film is about a then failed young artist Adolf Hitler (Noah Taylor) and a fictional art dealer Max Rothman (John Cusack). Before he led the whole nation to another violent war, Hitler was trying to make it as a painter, but he failed in the entrance exams for the art school. Now, the film gives a question -- What if he saw his life in a different way?

"Max" is set in 1918 in Munich, Germany. The post-war nation was suffering from the poverty and unemployment, and the distinction between those who have and those don't was too clear. It was the time of unrest for them, for many of the Germans considered their country was humiliated by unjust treaties. They are defeated, but still defiant.

Max Rothman is among the rich, dealing with avand-gard arts in the deserted factory. One day, he meets a struggling artist (so he thinks) Adolf Hilter at the backdoor of the building. He realizes that Hitler served in the previous war (Max lost one of his arms because of the war), and Max takes a pity on this miserably-clad small guy.

Then Hitler comes to him with his sketches, which Max thinks lacks the artist's inner voice. But we know Adolf was the son of the era, when everything was bleak and empty. And while Max encourages to find his own voice in the art, Adolf, constantly dissatisfied and angry, finds it in another quarter -- political speech.

The rest is history, as people say, and how the film ends does not matter. We know the outcome from the first. Still the film poses a question that is worth considering -- "Can he be anything else?" -- and more importantly, perhaps, "How could this small man with squeaking voice could move the whole nation in the tragic way?"

Molly Parker ("Kissed") appears as Max's wife, and Leelee Sobeski as his mistress. But their roles are not as big as the two leads, to whom "Max" belong exclusively.

Noah Tayler did an astounding job, making Hitler not a monster but someone who could have been different. He gives Hitler's slightly cartoonish images when we jeer at him, a deep meaning of its own -- frail, nervous, and eccentric -- all belong to the trait of some artists. But behind that pose of his self-importance, we see something very destructive.

Don't see the film for the story. See that as a character study against the background of the nihilistic world of the 1918 Germany. The photography (which reminds me of somber Eastern Europe films) capturing the grey city has its own power, like watching the hanging clouds before the rain. The cameraman Lajos Koltai's picture (actually set in Budapest) is itself a piece of art.

"Max" shows too many dialogues, and perhaps too introspective sometimes. But the film deserves our watching, and the theme is worth our considering. No wonder John Cusack did it without receiving money.

This is one of those "great pieces of art" that Cusack says he wants to do. This one is done very well.

My opinion of the viewing public, though, is that mostly it doesn't want to think this hard during a movie and particularly doesn't choose to understand the face of evil. (We might recognize it . . .)

Briefly we enter a movie cocoon. The one created for us. We want to be swept away, titillated, made to laugh, or cry, but not to think.

It (the public) wants to look at the evening news, see evil doers in other places in the world and then be able to turn off the set.

Max keeps it playing in your head.

I never heard of this film before I began my quest for all things Cusack . . . I know my life is limited to those things I allow in, and so I miss things . . . Sorry.

I bought Max last night because it was the next Cusack film I could find. It is dark and complicated and very POWERFUL. They never treat the subject matter lightly in this flick. It is meant, I think, to make you understand the descent into madness that comes with the urge to create. . . and how that madness can morph the creative, taking the person who owns it with them to anther place. (Sort of a scary concept considering my own drive to get a screenplay filmed.)

With Hitler there was the strange blend of politics as art . . . perhaps there is this with other politicians, too.

Perhaps politics is their art, when we think it is their vocation. And we would be part of their creation process, wouldn't we? As Max Rothman hoped to be part of Hitler's.

This film would've carried more power if it had not used a "cut-up" of different art dealers and patched them into the fictional character of Max Rothman. The narrative is choppy as is the acting, but Noah Taylor's performance gives a reason to see this film. Taylor's portrayal, although a bit over the top at times, does create a humanity for Hitler that has never been attempted for and so a reason to see this film. It is an interesting film to be made at this time, in the midst of surging nationalism in the U.S. and the might-makes-right mindset of U.S. leaders.

This is an interesting flick about what could have been. A young Adolph Hitler, juts out of the trenches, struggles to find himself through art and politics. Just when he finally seems to have found himself a break as an artist, other factors/coincidences come into play to eventually disuade him from painting.

The relationship between the cocky Rothmann, who really tries to help Hitler succeed, and the angry, insecure Hitler was done extremely well. This is almost a five star film, but Cusack's acting seemed plastic, which detracted from the overall potentially powerful impact that this film should have on its viewers. Still, it's one of those that will no doubt linger on in my mind for some time.

First impressions can be deadly. Promises broken can cause real pain. Watch what you say and do because you never know who's watching. As a mainline protestant I believe that man, while he may strive to be good is essentially evil. `The road to hell is paved with good intentions,' if you will. I believe jealousy, greed, and avarice are very much a part of the human condition and its only through the grace of God we are not lost.

I say this to illustrate a point. MAX is the story of two men, each on a quest to do something good. Each has a noble goal and yet both end up on a collision course with History. The first man is Max Rothchild (John Cusak, High Fidelity) a German Jew who has just returned from WWI missing an arm. He has settled back into his comfortable life of wealth and prosperity, with his beautiful wife (Molly Parker, Kissed) and his beautiful children. He has a mistress (Leelee Sobieski, My First Mister), and is a chain smoker. He probably drinks more than he should as well. He is also unable to do what he really loves, which is paint, so he does the next best thing. He becomes an art dealer. If he cannot create art why not discover the next great artist.

The other man is Adolph Hitler (Noah Taylor, Almost Famous) a German, who has returned from the war with nothing. He lives in the army barracks because he cannot afford a home for himself. He follows the rules and is straitlaced. He will not smoke. He does not drink (not even coffee) and he loves his country, a German all the way. But he does long to be a great artist.

One day these two men start a relationship. It is amicable if strained. Max takes Hitler under his wing. Trying to get him to open up and embrace his art. Hitler becomes fed up and is dragged away from his art by the army. They have given him the platform he's always wanted, and with this platform Hitler begins to rail against the Jews, and those that threaten the great country that is Germany. In the end this one man is forced to chose between art and power. Real history tells us what decision he made.

MAX is a fictional account of the early life of one of history's most evil men. But what I really liked about it is that it makes an attempt to get to heart of why people make the decisions that they do. Why did German nationalism lead to violence and genocide? Why do some people who are tested by pain survive and thrive, and others can be in the same place and become bitter? Why and what turned Hitler himself into a monster? Did he have a run in with a Jew that broke a promise or treated him like crud? All these questions come to mind and MAX tries to come to gripes with them.

What I also like about this movie is it has no hero, but allows you as the audience to be empathetic to these men. Maybe Hitler has a point. Maybe he has the right the feel put upon by the world. Why, when he plays by the rules, does he live in the gutter, while a fast talking, hard drinking, chain smoking, adulterer has a warm bed? It would make me mad too and doesn't jealousy make us do some pretty drastic things.

Writer/ first time Director Menno Meyjes (The Seige `Screenplay') has crafted a compelling and challenging story. The film makes a monster into a human being, not by praising him but by asking the one question we all ask, why? It doesn't begin to editorialize on what Hitler became, but presents us with a man who can make the right decision or walk down the wrong road. Of course we can never change the past, but we can try to find out where it all went wrong.

John Cusack does a marvelous job of painting the picture of a good guy with a great heart, but too many flaws. There is a great scene near the end of the film where his wife confronts him with his adultery. Max never once says he's sorry, and I don't think his wife expects him too. But she loves him too much to run away. Will Max change his ways, maybe?

Noah Taylor's Hitler has the perfect nuance. On one hand he's a bottled up ball of rage about to explode, on the other he's this wide-eyed dreamer looking for a shot. This is the hardest kind of part to play because the audience already comes in with the picture of what and who Hitler is, and not who he is at this moment. While he is an object of scorn, and rightly so. You can and must empathize with him, or the performance is lost. Taylor plays the right chords, and it works.

My favorite scene in the films comes as Hitler is giving a speech about the supremacy of the Aryan race and Germany in a local bar and nobody is paying attention to him. Except one kid. Later in the film Hitler is giving a similar speech to a room of about a hundred people and guess who's sitting there. That single kid has turned into hundreds. An idea, no matter how wrong and misguided, has power. It reminds me of those KKK rallies, they show on the local news. Sure hundreds show up to berate these people, but if one person hears and is mad at the world, they can be easily swayed. Makes you think, that maybe what we say and do can have an effect on the people around us.

MAX was my favorite film from last year and rightly so. It's bold, controversial, and asks a lot of questions, other films haven't. But mostly it's a human story about two men and their unlikely friendship. It's about striving to do what's right and it's about the power of art. It's about propaganda and politics--Hero's and madmen. MAX is a great film. ***** (Out of 5)

MAX begins in a giant art warehouse and creates a stark atmosphere of post-WWI darkness and chaos. Max (John Cusack) is an artist who lost his arm in the war and he meets Hitler (Noah Taylor), depicted as a directionless artist. The film bases some of its ideas on reality (Hitler was an aspiring artist, but before, not after the war), but one problem is we like and feel sympathy for this Hitler.

Noah Taylor doesn't resemble the real Adolph in the least; in the film he's an artist who isn't anti-semitic and he's too damn likeable and cool looking with his army trenchcoat looking and acting more like a post-modern beatnik than a Nazi. The Chaplin mustache isn't even here. (Though the real one donned a mustache from before WWI). He's coerced by the military into public speaking, and his speeches are interesting and comical. "I paid 10 marks for this coat" "You paid too much" "That's what I told the Jew who sold it to me."

Nevertheless, the point is made: had Hitler been prompted in another direction than politics the Holocaust may well have been avoided. And Max, now an art dealer trying to induce Hitler to pursue his art rather than politics is the focal point to the alternate reality. The ending is pretty predictable, and prompts one to ask, could something like this really have happened.

John Cusack does a good performance and his relationship with Hitler is what holds our interest throughout the film.

This has got to be one of the worst movies I have ever seen, excluding movies with words like "bikini" and "car wash" in the titles (that is, movies which aren't trying to be good). Yes, it explores the connection between power and aesthetics... but not in an interesting or entertaining way. John Cusack's acting was absolutely horrible as this role is clearly far too ambitious for his limited range. Don't get me wrong--I loved him in "High Fidelity," but he stunk up this film something awful. It takes what might conceivably be an interesting premise--that Hitler was, at heart, a frustrated artist who turned evil after he couldn't succeed at art but integrated art and aesthetic considerations into his rhetoric and other aspects of the reich--and makes it funnier and more ridiculous than any post-Dana Carvey-era SNL sketch. Everything about the film was unconvincing, from the young Hitler, to Cusack's missing arm... I was absolutely shocked to see the number of positive reviews this film had gotten. AVOID this movie. It is just bad, bad, bad. Take a cue from the fact that they are being sold used for under four dollars... SUCKS! See other reviews for discussions of historical inaccuracies.

"Max" is, no doubt, an important film. The exploration of monstrosity through humanity, and how self-expression can be a gift and a blessing or a tool used to attain power is potent throughout the film. Though it does tend to drag a little and the script is, at times, terribly unnatural, the acting and ending make up for most of these flaws.

Cusack is very good as Max Rothman, Jewish art dealer with an arm destroyed in his service during World War One. As has been said, Taylor is excellent -- haunting and oddly sad, portraying a tortured young Hitler before he truly and completely believed his own drivel. Though both actors come off as false or awkward during rare moments, this is hardly a fault of their own -- this is the fault of false or awkward screenwriting.

The other main fault, along with the screenwriting, has to do with a dragging mid-section, where everything seems very drawn out. However, keep your interest focused here and you will be repaid with a stunning ending.

That is, in my opinion, the best part of the movie -- heavy on symbolism and real-life foreshadowing of the horror we all know is now bound to follow... Despite the fact that I knew throughout the film that Hitler was doomed to become an evil man and a source of unspeakable terror, It felt like I was holding out for another outcome. This film tangles possibility in one's face, and then switches it with the cold reality that we've all learned in history books, and this switch makes for a sobering and emotional finale.

Anyway. If you're open to a fresh (if fictionalized) look on this era of history and if you're willing to stand some bad dialogue and slow pacing to get to some great acting and an intesne ending, then this movie should not disappoint you.