I’m not sure how to put my thoughts into words on this, but I just finished watching a series of short actor interviews made during the filming of the German film Downfall. I find them incredible–if nothing else, in the way they highlight the vapidity of similar interviews on the sets of American films.
Charlie Rose does good actor/director interviews.
His interview with Quentin Tarantino is my favorite interview of his.
Seeing as how the Hitler regime is viewed as the epitome of evil throughout much of the world, a great many of today’s Germans are understandably sensitive about the subject. The making of Downfall was a risky venture, and the very notion of portraying Hitler realistically caused outrage in some circles.
That being said, whoever was responsible for casting the film was a freaking genius. Not only are the performances stellar throughout, many of the featured players bear a frightening resemblance to the person being portrayed. Furthermore, the DVD includes extensive interviews with many of the cast members (Corinna Harfouch included) who approached the project with the full consciousness that they were embarking on something of great significance.
Bruno Ganz’s performance as Hitler is one of the greatest pieces of acting I’ve ever seen. It gives me shivers every time.
She was great in that movie. Should have been nominated for an Oscar (assuming she wasn’t- I haven’t checked). The scenes in which she drugs her children (the first time with a powerful sedative, the second with poison) her face was a masterpiece of silent acting that would have put the Sisters Gish to shame, and even without being fluent in German I could tell her spoken lines were no less fantastic.
Sorry, now that the weekend’s done, I can’t resist giving my OP a bump:
I haven’t seen Downfall yet, but it’s on my Netflix queue; I’ll have to make sure to watch the interviews.
I did see Lives of Other People, about an agent of the notorious Stazi police in East Germany; I had the same impression from the interviews with the directors and actors, many of whom had grown up under that system – that they have a much deeper personal understanding of politics in the concrete than most Americans. Even with all our problems, and as bad as it’s been for some of our population (and in spite of horrible leadership for the past few years), as a republic the U.S. has been remarkably livable for quite a while.