Obchod na korze (1965)
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FilmFan720
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FYI: Obchod na Korze or, The Shop on Main Street will be shown on TCM during its "31 Days of Oscar" month-long celebration on February 4th at 12:30am. If you haven't seen it yet, I highly recommend it (Oscar nod watchers can mark Ida Kaminska off their Best Actress list and the film itself for Best Foreign Film).
Edited By flipp525 on 1169760530
Edited By flipp525 on 1169760530
"The mantle of spinsterhood was definitely in her shoulders. She was twenty five and looked it."
-Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell
-Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell
OBCHOD NA KORZE, or THE SHOP ON MAIN STREET (1965)
cast: Ida Kaminska, Jozef Króner, Hana Slivková, Adám Matejka, Martin Gregor, Martin Hollý; dir. Ján Kadár, Elmar Klos
A Czech political film that brilliantly encapsulates the horror of fascism and human degradation in a more profound way than almost any other recent cinematic venture, Obchod na korze (or, The Shop on Main Street) features a haunting score, excellent direction and heartbreaking performances by the two leads, particularly, Ida Kaminska’s unforgettable portrayal of Mrs. Lautmann. The movie realistically explores the fine subleties of human morality and is also a castigation of the ideology of terror, which is the very foundation of fascism.
With his small town inching everyday toward total control by a “Nazi-like” party (so said because their symbol is only swastika-like) the poor, henpecked husband Tony Brtko is made “Aryan manager” of an old Jewish widow’s dusty-old button shop by his brother-in-law, a Fascist officer in charge of building a huge "Tower of Babel"-like structure in the middle of town. The proprietess takes Tony on but is convinced that he is only her assistant; the idea that he is now the owner of the shop and she, his employee, is a concept that doesn’t fully compute. She either doesn’t hear it, or doesn’t want to hear it, a coping mechanism the character uses throughout the film to deal with unpleasant situations which ultimately contributes to her downfall. Is she really completely unaware that WWII is raging around her? Does she simply choose to dodder around in a frustrating oblivion? It's difficult to say definitively.
The two shops prominently featured in the film themselves become symbols for concentration camp cast-offs. The mental images of old buttons in Lautmann’s shop as well as scores of cut hair in the Jewish barber shop calls to mind the room of glasses at the Holocaust museum or the stacks of shorn hair outside of the showers.
The movie culminates in a devastating twenty-five minute conclusion that sees Tony become, at once, Mrs. Lautman's rescuer and condemner; her salvation and her horror. The final image lingers long after you've turned the film off. One of the finest foreign films from the last sixty years.
Ida Kaminska deservedly garnered an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress in 1967 and the film, itself, won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film.
***** out of 5
Edited By flipp525 on 1193413728
cast: Ida Kaminska, Jozef Króner, Hana Slivková, Adám Matejka, Martin Gregor, Martin Hollý; dir. Ján Kadár, Elmar Klos
A Czech political film that brilliantly encapsulates the horror of fascism and human degradation in a more profound way than almost any other recent cinematic venture, Obchod na korze (or, The Shop on Main Street) features a haunting score, excellent direction and heartbreaking performances by the two leads, particularly, Ida Kaminska’s unforgettable portrayal of Mrs. Lautmann. The movie realistically explores the fine subleties of human morality and is also a castigation of the ideology of terror, which is the very foundation of fascism.
With his small town inching everyday toward total control by a “Nazi-like” party (so said because their symbol is only swastika-like) the poor, henpecked husband Tony Brtko is made “Aryan manager” of an old Jewish widow’s dusty-old button shop by his brother-in-law, a Fascist officer in charge of building a huge "Tower of Babel"-like structure in the middle of town. The proprietess takes Tony on but is convinced that he is only her assistant; the idea that he is now the owner of the shop and she, his employee, is a concept that doesn’t fully compute. She either doesn’t hear it, or doesn’t want to hear it, a coping mechanism the character uses throughout the film to deal with unpleasant situations which ultimately contributes to her downfall. Is she really completely unaware that WWII is raging around her? Does she simply choose to dodder around in a frustrating oblivion? It's difficult to say definitively.
The two shops prominently featured in the film themselves become symbols for concentration camp cast-offs. The mental images of old buttons in Lautmann’s shop as well as scores of cut hair in the Jewish barber shop calls to mind the room of glasses at the Holocaust museum or the stacks of shorn hair outside of the showers.
The movie culminates in a devastating twenty-five minute conclusion that sees Tony become, at once, Mrs. Lautman's rescuer and condemner; her salvation and her horror. The final image lingers long after you've turned the film off. One of the finest foreign films from the last sixty years.
Ida Kaminska deservedly garnered an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress in 1967 and the film, itself, won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film.
***** out of 5
Edited By flipp525 on 1193413728
"The mantle of spinsterhood was definitely in her shoulders. She was twenty five and looked it."
-Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell
-Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell