Audience Member
Audacious war film by auteur director Samuel Fuller. This film is outrageous, even by fuller standards, starting the film with a dead body being riddled with machine gun fire, or playing a Paul Anka love song over scenes of war and destruction during the opening credits, and using Wagner to highlight operatic scenes of war long before Francis Ford Coppola did so in his audacious war film "Apocalypse, Now". This film is the Fuller, punch-in-the-gut gritty version of "Judgement at Nuremberg," telling the story of post WWII Germany through a love story of sorts between American GI James Best and German fraulein Susan Cummings. Nuremberg is a much slicker production, but Fuller's post WWII Germany is filled with unrepentant neo-Nazi fighters still carrying on the war, food riots, rape, brutality, discrimination and grueling documentation of Nazi atrocities. However, as edgy as this film is, it's undermined by overuse of stock footage and documentary elements that take you our of the melodrama about the tension filled relationship between Best and Cummings. Some may find Fuller's in-you-face style lacking subtlety, but that's what makes this a Sam Fuller picture and not one by Stanley Kramer. Still, Fuller films and look like nothing else coming out of Hollywood at the time and is well worth watching.
Rated 4/5 Stars •
Rated 4 out of 5 stars
01/31/23
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Audience Member
it's not subtle but then it wouldn't be fuller. who else could score WW2 with beethoven's ninth and wagner's ride of the valkyries? the hero seems too naive and the change of heart finale a little abrupt but there are some great scenes here, especially among the 'werewolves'. well done intercutting of newsreel footage helps with authenticity, including a few scenes from the death camps so beware
Rated 3.5/5 Stars •
Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars
02/09/23
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Audience Member
Dramatically terse and unsubtle, even by writer/director Samuel Fullerâ(TM)s standards, "Verboten!," one of his least-known films, explores the panorama of Germany Year Zero and wields the usual pressurized melodrama with a social and historical conscience-raising purpose that was Fuller's specialty. The film displays Fullerâ(TM)s strengths and weaknesses as a director. Made on a low budget, full of odd casting choices, curtailed ideas and fragmented story arcs, it still delivers with a force and clarity of intelligence the desired impact few other directors could ever muster, as it charges into the heady atmosphere of the post-War mixture of utter defeat and lingering horror.
"Verboten!" is a rip-roaring little film, and one that looks remarkably good thanks to Fullerâ(TM)s vivid eye and the technically excellent work of DP Joseph Biroc. His carefully lit, heavily shadowed, deep-focus visuals seem to keep the energy and beauty of noir film alive long after most such intricacy had vanished from Hollywood cinema. Fullerâ(TM)s stylistic creativity here seems to have had an impact on other filmmakers, especially in his use of classical music throughout, still an uncommon practice at the time. The concussive strains of Beethovenâ(TM)s Fifth Symphony, anticipating its similar usage in "The Longest Day" in establishing the apocalyptic struggle, give way to swooning quotes from Liszt and, most impressively, an electrifying montage of the Werewolvesâ(TM) crimes and the occupiersâ(TM) hunt set to Wagnerâ(TM)s âRide of the Valkyries,â? 20 years before "Apocalypse Now." Here Fullerâ(TM)s ironic counterpoint of high culture and down-and-dirty business is at its most vital.
Rated 3/5 Stars •
Rated 3 out of 5 stars
02/19/23
Full Review
Audience Member
Dramatically terse and unsubtle, even by writer/director Samuel Fuller's standards, "Verboten!," one of his least-known films, explores the panorama of Germany Year Zero and wields the usual pressurized melodrama with a social and historical conscience-raising purpose that was Fuller's specialty. The film displays Fuller's strengths and weaknesses as a director. Made on a low budget, full of odd casting choices, curtailed ideas and fragmented story arcs, it still delivers with a force and clarity of intelligence the desired impact few other directors could ever muster, as it charges into the heady atmosphere of the post-War mixture of utter defeat and lingering horror.
"Verboten!" is a rip-roaring little film, and one that looks remarkably good thanks to Fuller's vivid eye and the technically excellent work of DP Joseph Biroc. His carefully lit, heavily shadowed, deep-focus visuals seem to keep the energy and beauty of noir film alive long after most such intricacy had vanished from Hollywood cinema. Fuller's stylistic creativity here seems to have had an impact on other filmmakers, especially in his use of classical music throughout, still an uncommon practice at the time. The concussive strains of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony, anticipating its similar usage in "The Longest Day" in establishing the apocalyptic struggle, give way to swooning quotes from Liszt and, most impressively, an electrifying montage of the Werewolves' crimes and the occupiers' hunt set to Wagner's "Ride of the Valkyries," 20 years before "Apocalypse Now." Here Fuller's ironic counterpoint of high culture and down-and-dirty business is at its most vital.
Rated 3/5 Stars •
Rated 3 out of 5 stars
02/22/23
Full Review
Audience Member
Another typical honest, frank and too the point Samuel Fuller war film. This time its all about the aftermath of the 2nd world war and the difference between a Nazi and a German. Some real footage inserted into the film - some Holocaust footage as well, which is hard to watch. Good flick - just not a stand out for me.
Rated 3/5 Stars •
Rated 3 out of 5 stars
01/22/23
Full Review
Audience Member
"Yer no Nazi, I'm no soldier, and there's no war." An enjoyable, but ultimately unsatisfying post-WWII melodrama about a G.I. falling for a rather conniving, survivalist fraulein and the riotous violence that result. I dig the complicated emotions at play and Tom Pittman's guerrilla warrior manages to be both quite dastardly and forthright with James Best's hero, but the climax is sudden and a bit too tidy. And the Nuremberg revelations seem out of place. A solid film, but definitely not one of Sam Fuller's best. VF.
Rated 3/5 Stars •
Rated 3 out of 5 stars
02/10/23
Full Review
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