Judgment At Nuremberg (1961) -
Considering the sensitive nature of this film's topic, I was surprised that it had been released when it was and I would go so far as to say that it might have been the 'Schindler's List' (1993) of its day.
I don't wish to diminish the films of the early to mid 20th century, but in general I had found them to be slightly tamer in what they delivered, especially with the censorship of the period, so the content of this one was certainly more than I had expected.
I had thought to find a boring black and white war film set in a court, but what I saw instead was a complicated and interesting exploration of the Nuremberg Trials that followed the horrors of WWII. A sensitive look at more than just the viewpoint of the U. S. A. And its representatives, but also a cross section of those others affected by the well known events that occurred as port of Hitler's "Solution".
The perspectives included German and Jewish witnesses, the everyday German, in the form of the household staff, Mr & Mrs Halbestadt (Ben Wright & Virginia Christine) and of course the difficult duty of Chief Judge Dan Haywood, skilfully played by Spencer Tracy. Not to forget the view of Mrs Bertholt (Marlene Dietrich) who was trying to rebuild a broken country after the bombings and cultural ransacking and her own husband had been tried and hung for his "War Crimes".
In general it was a horrible subject matter for a film and a terrible task to ask of any Judge to preside over. I had to think that it must have been almost as difficult to act these parts as it would have been for those Solicitors/Lawyers that had to represent the various people accused at the time of the real trials, although the defence attorney may have been read to be a supporter of what the accused had done and of the regime so recently fallen.
In that role I could appreciate Maximilian Schell's passionate delivery as Hans Rolfe and agreed that he had deserved his Oscar for it. He was a bit shouty at times that seemed unnecessary, but I found myself buying what he was selling as he defended what the four men had done in accordance with the laws of the country at the time. By logic and the standard rules of law they were innocent, but not by the greater laws of morality and ethics.
I did find it a curious touch that I wasn't exactly endeared to Richard Widmark as U. S. Colonel Lawson however, because his character, one from the winning and "Right Side" of things was a bit abrasive, but perhaps he was just a tired victim of his time involved in the various trials he had taken part in and could no longer see that things were not always cut and dry, right or wrong.
That's how much the story affected me, those on trial set in to motion the end of so many lives and yet I'm still on the fence as to whether they were acting in what they had thought were the best interests of their country and to some degree the world.
I actually hadn't even recognised Burt Lancaster in his role, his delivery was so good that I felt I was seeing a real Dr. Janning and I wasn't actually sure if I was supposed to know the names of those on trial or if they were fictional, because my knowledge of World War II didn't stretch to more than the most well known, but having read the IMDB trivia to find out that Burt as Dr. Ernst Janning and Werner Klemperer in his role of Emil Hahn were likely to be representing the real life Franz Schlegelberger and Oswald Rothaug it somehow seemed to drive home the heinousness of the "Characters"contribution to the War that little bit more, although Rolfe did do well to defend their actions, making some very valid points that got me thinking.
Although I obviously knew of the atrocities of the holocaust, regarding the camps, I hadn't known or certainly couldn't recall that people had also been sterilised by the Nazi's too (And I definitely didn't know that the U. S. had a similar policy), so that element of the trial was new and another horrifying thing to discover.
It was also really something when the film used genuine Concentration Camp footage. I could only imagine how difficult and uncomfortable that must have been for the cinema audiences to watch in 1961, just 15 years after the events depicted. Even in 2024 it made me feel not only nauseous, but tearful and so very angry. I actually had to lower my eyes to only listen to the speech being delivered by Lawson during those moments.
Having not heard much about this one previously and despite the fact that it featured on IMDB's 250 films to watch list (I haven't really trusted those lists having watched so many films that haven't done anything for me), I was actually shocked by how good this one was.
Initially I hadn't thought that I was in the right frame of mind to watch it, because it was going to be too necessary to use my brain, which hadn't been working at full capacity, but I had also felt that at the very beginning there had been a lot of key points missed out, disconnections that made it harder to follow and upset the flow of the trial and in an order that was not easy to follow.
By the time I reached the end however, I was incredibly engaged with it and felt that they had put it together very well after all.
I felt it was obvious that the Producers, Writers & Directors were trying not to paint any party as perfect, or without fault in order to avoid showing or stirring up any specific prejudices, which I commended.
There were also many clever little aspects of things that must have been true of the original case - A journalist who couldn't see that there was a story for him about what was happening, because of a lack of interest from the readers back home who had grown bored of it all and just wanted to forget all of the troubles and the upset caused by those that they had lost.
And of course the general obscurity of trying to put these overwhelming crimes on trial had to be carefully handled and thoughtful in its depictions.
I also liked the fact that the actors used accents, instead of just expecting the audience to believe that they were German, as so many other films have done and in my opinion wrongly. And the clever way that I was shown how they all understood each other through their headphones, to make it clear that when they did speak English, that's how we were understanding them was a nice touch too. It meant that the whole thing wasn't stilted with constant translation. That element reminded me of Captain Kirk and Dr McCoy's (DeForest Kelley) trial in 'Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country' (1991), perhaps William Shatner had suggested it to the sci-fi writers, remembering it from his role of Captain Harrison Byers in this film, which was probably the least hammy performance I've ever seen from him, although I do love him for his cheesey ways.
So, yeah, that's my review? I really appreciated the delivery of the concept and the sensitivity shown. I would definitely recommend it.
733.11/1000.
Considering the sensitive nature of this film's topic, I was surprised that it had been released when it was and I would go so far as to say that it might have been the 'Schindler's List' (1993) of its day.
I don't wish to diminish the films of the early to mid 20th century, but in general I had found them to be slightly tamer in what they delivered, especially with the censorship of the period, so the content of this one was certainly more than I had expected.
I had thought to find a boring black and white war film set in a court, but what I saw instead was a complicated and interesting exploration of the Nuremberg Trials that followed the horrors of WWII. A sensitive look at more than just the viewpoint of the U. S. A. And its representatives, but also a cross section of those others affected by the well known events that occurred as port of Hitler's "Solution".
The perspectives included German and Jewish witnesses, the everyday German, in the form of the household staff, Mr & Mrs Halbestadt (Ben Wright & Virginia Christine) and of course the difficult duty of Chief Judge Dan Haywood, skilfully played by Spencer Tracy. Not to forget the view of Mrs Bertholt (Marlene Dietrich) who was trying to rebuild a broken country after the bombings and cultural ransacking and her own husband had been tried and hung for his "War Crimes".
In general it was a horrible subject matter for a film and a terrible task to ask of any Judge to preside over. I had to think that it must have been almost as difficult to act these parts as it would have been for those Solicitors/Lawyers that had to represent the various people accused at the time of the real trials, although the defence attorney may have been read to be a supporter of what the accused had done and of the regime so recently fallen.
In that role I could appreciate Maximilian Schell's passionate delivery as Hans Rolfe and agreed that he had deserved his Oscar for it. He was a bit shouty at times that seemed unnecessary, but I found myself buying what he was selling as he defended what the four men had done in accordance with the laws of the country at the time. By logic and the standard rules of law they were innocent, but not by the greater laws of morality and ethics.
I did find it a curious touch that I wasn't exactly endeared to Richard Widmark as U. S. Colonel Lawson however, because his character, one from the winning and "Right Side" of things was a bit abrasive, but perhaps he was just a tired victim of his time involved in the various trials he had taken part in and could no longer see that things were not always cut and dry, right or wrong.
That's how much the story affected me, those on trial set in to motion the end of so many lives and yet I'm still on the fence as to whether they were acting in what they had thought were the best interests of their country and to some degree the world.
I actually hadn't even recognised Burt Lancaster in his role, his delivery was so good that I felt I was seeing a real Dr. Janning and I wasn't actually sure if I was supposed to know the names of those on trial or if they were fictional, because my knowledge of World War II didn't stretch to more than the most well known, but having read the IMDB trivia to find out that Burt as Dr. Ernst Janning and Werner Klemperer in his role of Emil Hahn were likely to be representing the real life Franz Schlegelberger and Oswald Rothaug it somehow seemed to drive home the heinousness of the "Characters"contribution to the War that little bit more, although Rolfe did do well to defend their actions, making some very valid points that got me thinking.
Although I obviously knew of the atrocities of the holocaust, regarding the camps, I hadn't known or certainly couldn't recall that people had also been sterilised by the Nazi's too (And I definitely didn't know that the U. S. had a similar policy), so that element of the trial was new and another horrifying thing to discover.
It was also really something when the film used genuine Concentration Camp footage. I could only imagine how difficult and uncomfortable that must have been for the cinema audiences to watch in 1961, just 15 years after the events depicted. Even in 2024 it made me feel not only nauseous, but tearful and so very angry. I actually had to lower my eyes to only listen to the speech being delivered by Lawson during those moments.
Having not heard much about this one previously and despite the fact that it featured on IMDB's 250 films to watch list (I haven't really trusted those lists having watched so many films that haven't done anything for me), I was actually shocked by how good this one was.
Initially I hadn't thought that I was in the right frame of mind to watch it, because it was going to be too necessary to use my brain, which hadn't been working at full capacity, but I had also felt that at the very beginning there had been a lot of key points missed out, disconnections that made it harder to follow and upset the flow of the trial and in an order that was not easy to follow.
By the time I reached the end however, I was incredibly engaged with it and felt that they had put it together very well after all.
I felt it was obvious that the Producers, Writers & Directors were trying not to paint any party as perfect, or without fault in order to avoid showing or stirring up any specific prejudices, which I commended.
There were also many clever little aspects of things that must have been true of the original case - A journalist who couldn't see that there was a story for him about what was happening, because of a lack of interest from the readers back home who had grown bored of it all and just wanted to forget all of the troubles and the upset caused by those that they had lost.
And of course the general obscurity of trying to put these overwhelming crimes on trial had to be carefully handled and thoughtful in its depictions.
I also liked the fact that the actors used accents, instead of just expecting the audience to believe that they were German, as so many other films have done and in my opinion wrongly. And the clever way that I was shown how they all understood each other through their headphones, to make it clear that when they did speak English, that's how we were understanding them was a nice touch too. It meant that the whole thing wasn't stilted with constant translation. That element reminded me of Captain Kirk and Dr McCoy's (DeForest Kelley) trial in 'Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country' (1991), perhaps William Shatner had suggested it to the sci-fi writers, remembering it from his role of Captain Harrison Byers in this film, which was probably the least hammy performance I've ever seen from him, although I do love him for his cheesey ways.
So, yeah, that's my review? I really appreciated the delivery of the concept and the sensitivity shown. I would definitely recommend it.
733.11/1000.