Remember (2015)

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Movie
Original title Remember
Country of production Canada ,
Germany
original language German
Publishing year 2015
length 95 minutes
Age rating FSK 12
Rod
Director Atom Egoyan
script Benjamin August
production Ari Lantos ,
Robert Lantos
music Mychael Danna
camera Paul Sarossy
cut Christopher Donaldson
occupation

Remember (German reference title: Remember - don't forget to remember ) is a Canadian - German thriller . Atom Egoyan directed the film and Benjamin August wrote the screenplay . The cinema release in Germany was on December 31, 2015.

action

Auschwitz survivor Max Rosenbaum lives in a New York retirement home with Zev Guttman, who has dementia. Max has often reminded Zev that their families were murdered in Auschwitz by the former block leader Otto Wallisch, who, however, emigrated to America under the false name "Rudy Kurlander". Max convinces Zev to avenge the deaths of their families by finding and killing the block leader. After Max found out the addresses of four men, which could fit Wallisch's description, Zev flees the old people's home and starts his assignment. He buys a pistol and looks for the first Rudy Kurlander on his list.

But this first Kurlander can prove to Zev that he is not the one he is looking for, but that he was a soldier in the Wehrmacht's Africa Corps during World War II . Zev then sets off for the second Kurlander, whom he finds bedridden in a retirement home in Canada. This even confirms Zev's suspicions that he is also German and was in Auschwitz. In the further conversation, however, Zev sees the prisoner number on his arm and he explains that he was imprisoned as a homosexual.

Zev then goes to the house of the third Rudy Kurlander. There he learns from his son, the police officer John Kurlander, that he has already died. John invites Zev, assuming that he is a former friend of his father's, into his house, where he first drinks water and then alcohol. After a few glasses of whiskey, John explains that as a soldier his father was a boy and a cook. However, when John notices that there is a row of numbers tattooed on Zev's arm, it is revealed that Zev is a neo-Nazi. He insults Zev, threatens him and sets his German shepherd on him. Zev then shoots the dog first, then John, and then leaves the house.

After Zev has visited the house of the fourth Rudy Kurlander, he recognizes him by his voice. Zev's son Charles Guttman also comes into the house a little later. When Zev threatens Rudy's granddaughter with his weapon, Rudy Kurlander explains himself and reveals that his name is Kunibert Sturm and that Zev's real name is Otto Wallisch and that they were both guards in Auschwitz. He goes on to say that they tattooed each other after the war so that they could live as Jewish survivors in the USA without being recognized. Zev then shoots Kunibert Sturm. With the words "I remember" (English "I remember") he then points the gun at himself and shoots himself because he can no longer live with the truth. In the nursing home, the residents finally see this news on the news and Max explains to the shocked residents that he knew that Zev and Rudy Kurlander were identical to "Otto Wallisch" and "Kunibert Sturm".

reception

The film received mostly mixed to positive reviews. On Metacritic , the film received a Metascore of 52/100 based on 25 reviews, and on Rotten Tomatoes , 70 percent of the 71 reviews were positive.

The film service thinks Remember is a "well constructed and grippingly staged thriller" that lives "mainly from its grandiose actors", but would occasionally overstrain the credibility of the plot and also lead to an "all too sensational approach." with the Holocaust theme “lead.

At the 2016 Canadian Screen Awards , the film was recognized for Best Original Screenplay and was nominated for Best Picture, Best Actor, and Best Visual Effects. At the Calgary International Film Festival 2015, Remember was previously awarded the Audience Award for the best feature film together with Raum .

The German Film and Media Evaluation FBW in Wiesbaden awarded the film the title valuable.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Release certificate for Remember . Voluntary self-regulation of the film industry , November 2015 (PDF; test number: 155 743 K).
  2. ↑ Remember - short review. In: Filmdienst.de. Retrieved May 6, 2016 .