MovieChat Forums > The Big Lift (1950) Discussion > Children in alley

Children in alley

posted 16 years ago by bubie39
4 replies | jump to latest

Part of the semi-documentary action of this movie was a glimpse into the ruins in a narrow street or pathway where it seemed that children were actually living in this rubble strewn alley, I assume mostly orphans. This COULDN'T have been actual footage of lost children after the war, could it have? If the movie was filmed in 1949, could there still have been children living under those conditions four years after the war ended? This film, while quite formulaic, has been haunting my dreams the last few days since I saw it because of those children.

[–] deschreiber 15 years ago

I'm certain kids lived like that after the war. Many people were on the edge of starvation. After all, that was the whole point of the Berlin airlift. But it's hard to imagine them exploiting real street kids for the movie.

[–] stanleybix-1 12 years ago

Extras, every movie with any crowd or group or passersby are played by paid extras!

[–] yankeeclipper7075907 10 years ago

There is another period film from this same era called Germany, Year Zero (Germania Anno Zero) which shows the same situation as in here, only even more graphic form, with prostitution and implied paedophilia as a means of survival...

[–] Buckaroo-Robot-Monster 9 years ago

Check out Montgomery Clift's earlier film The Search.