This movie used to be a staple in filmmaking classes. Do filmmakers still watch this? I don't find anybody reference anymore. It's very well made and I am surprised in the way it seems to have disappeared.
shareJust watched it two hours ago in Theory.
shareyeah, we just watched it in my film class
shareI'm giving a presentation on it in my 60's film class.
shareIt's a well-worn but essential textbook for students of the acting profession.
shareThis Seat Taken--I am so glad to hear that this film is an essential textbook for acting students. Especially Rod Steiger's utter agony scenes with Rodriguez and during the death of Ortiz, my whole body nearly exploded; I think if I saw those as a child, I would have vomited from the intensity of what was expressed. THAT was acting with a capital "A"!
shareWatching it today in my intro to film class.
shareI just saw it today in my Cinema Survey class. Unfortunately most of the class left...afraid of black and white movies I guess.
"They hate you if you're clever and they despise a fool."
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Students are allowed to leave the class on a whim. Odd. How do they expect to know the classics?
shareyes, just watched it for editing..
sharewe watched it as a Lumet film - "Great Directors" class where the prof chose Lumet and Frankenheimer as our topics this semester. It looks like it's still used as a text in a variety of different film subjects; directing, acting, editing, history, etc. Which is nice to know because it's great.
My professor mentioned how overlooked this film is as, not only a great movie, but a "Holocaust" movie. Said he expected it to have been rediscovered after Schindler's List came out. Really is a relatively unknown gem.
Yes, this film is far too undersung. It's a masterpiece of editing and the simulation of subjective experience, not to mention a groundbreaking work on race relations generally (not "just" a holocaust film), with refreshingly three-dimensional minority characters all around. You have to admire a movie that's pretty much about the ultimate victim (a Holocaust survivor who lost his family to the Nazis), and shows him behaving like a cruel cynical misanthrope for most of the film. Through editing and composition we FEEL what he does, and understand why he is behaving how he is. The scene where the mobster takes him to task for putting harsh realities like where his pawnshop's income actually comes from was fantastic.
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