Twenty years after Walter Ruttmann’s celebration of the German capital Berlin: Symphony of a Great City comes Italian director Roberto Rossellini and the final film in his neorealist trilogy with the spotlight on the ravages and destruction of war.
A destroyed city forms the perversely beautiful yet stark backdrop. A young boy (Edmund Moeschke) left to his own devices looking to find ways of supporting his family falls foul of the black market and the desperation of post-war survival mentality.
Marred occasionally by an overly melodramatic and intrusive score, a riveting and deeply humane Germany Year Zero is a visually elegaic, intense, tragic drama. With its predominantly non-professional cast, it’s a true classic of Italian post-war neorealism.
Rating: 81%
Director: Roberto Rossellini (Rome, Open City, Paisà)
Writer: Roberto Rossellini (Rome, Open City, Paisà), Carlo Lizzani (Bitter Rice, Fontamara), Max Kolpé (La crise est finie, Der Mann der nicht nein sagen konnte)
Main cast: Edmund Moeschke, Ernst Pittschau (Das Bildnis des Dorian Gray, Junge Adler), Franz-Otto Krüger (Der Pauker, The Ballad of Berlin)
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