Don’t know what else to say here, 'cept that I really enjoyed it. WWII not being my forte, obviously I have no idea as to the accuracy of the project.
Also greatly enjoyed Hank Azaria’s work. It’s the first time I’ve ever seen him do something serious, and I’m glad I caught it.[sub]I didn’t even mind David Schwimmer![/sub]
At any rate, just to get some discussion going here, my wife and I were talking about the guy who used to be Donald Sutherland’s driver, damned if I can remember the name. Anyhoo, she asked why he was always running around wearing the SS uniform. My guess was that, while not a bad lookin’ fella, his face was rather unremarkable, and the director used the uniform to allow the audience to remember who he was. She guessed that his character didn’t have anything else to wear, which also works, I suppose…
Anyone else see the show, or is this thread gonna drop like a rock? Questions, comments? Things I might have missed?
The really interesting shot of the woman with the rope on the roof throwing the cocktail was reused three times. It was neat the first time I saw it in the commercials but come on.
The reason the guy was in the SS uniform was because it was a great disguise and probably one of the few outfits he had.
What terrible luck this mini series had. It was perfect scheduled, but because of the delays, it was forced up against the WS and Emmys. I watched the WS. I’m sure it will be out on DVD/VHS soon enough.
I saw part one, thought it was pretty good. its nice to have a new face for Mordechai Anielewicz to use when i read Harry Turtledove novels. I had been using that guy from Screamers that had the teardrop tatoo and was really a screamer.
But anyway, too bad part one got stuck in the worst possible day to be on tv against anything.
I thought it was pretty good, although David Schwimmer’s accent was a bit hard to take. Hank Azaria was great.
My only real problem with it was that during the last part of the second episode, there were WAY too many commercials. It was like five minutes of commercials every ten minutes. Guys, if the show is only 3.5 hours long, just make it 3.5 hours long. DON’T throw in an extra 30 minutes of commercials at the end. It nearly ruined the last part of the show for me.
I also wondered why that guy didn’t take off the German uniform after it was no longer useful as a disguise. At least the insignia.
This is one reason why I’m glad I live on the West Coast. By the time Part One began at 9PM (PST), the WS had been over for about an hour. I was able to watch both.
I thought it was a great series. I was saddened when they revealed that the woman played by Sobieski was killed only a week after escaping Warsaw. She was a great woman and Sobieski was great playing the part.
One thing that bugged me about the promotion is that they began Part Two saying that Donald Sutherland was starring, even though his character committed suicide in Part One!
Did anyone else notice it was Cary (Princess Bride) Elwes as the propagandist?
Jon Voight was chillingly believable as a Nazi: cold, methodical, without a trace of empathy for the people he was trying to kill.
I thought it was quite good – the first part was cinematically better but the second had more emotional impact (well, they both did for me – if I were posting in the “When’s the last time you cried” thread, I know what my answer would be).
I went out last night and bought one of the books on which the miniseries was based – Memoirs of a Warsaw Ghetto Fighter – and I can hardly put it down. I was written by Kazik (played by Stephen Moyer in the movie) and is completely engrossing. It’s definitely worth the $9.95. There is also a good amount of stuff on the Web about this uprising and about the people portrayed in the movie in particular. Reading the book and different Web pages has filled in the confusing parts to me, such as what happened to all those people who didn’t get out of Mila 18.
The film told an incredible story. Azaria, Voight, and Sobieski were solid, as were many of the players I did not recognize. I agree about the commercials - YIKES PEOPLE - it’s not like I’m going to pause in the middle of a film about the Warsaw Ghetto uprising to ponder 0.9% financing on a car! I like that it was done in widescreen. The featured music was beautiful. Who is David Schwimmer’s agent that suddenly he is in all these serious television gigs?
Most of all I took away the incredible courage of these people. They knew that they were probably going to die, but they were going to force the Germans to take apart the city brick by brick in order to kill them. I left the film with incredible admiration for the fighters and a sense of how lucky I am.
I’ve spent a fair amount of time in Warsaw, and the photos from that period are really something to see - the city really was a smoking heap of rubble. They’ve since rebuilt the central square to look exactly as it once did, but the majority of the architechture now is “Soviet Hell” with a new smattering of Office Depot and K-Mart.
I’ll have to wait until it comes out on video and check it out then. The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising is a tremendous story in and of itself for a number of reasons, and I wish I’d had the time to sit down and watch it.
Aguecheek, if you want to see Hank Azaria in another serious role, check out The Cradle Will Rock. It’s got Cary Elwes in it too, but this time they’re both on the same side
Olentzero, if you’re at Lunch Bunch on Friday, I’ll bring it along. Like I said before, I taped the thing, all I’m missing is the first 15 mins.
Actually, the part that got me the most was in the first half…[Spoilers off the port bow!]
When they broke the girl’s leg 'cause they weren’t taking cripples at that point. I’m not gonna say exactly what I did, 'cause I got a tough rep to uphold ;), but it did get my wife to run in from the next room and then chastise me for scaring the bejazus out of her. That brought it all home to me; what some people will go through to survive.
Commercials sucked, but I got lotsa pee/smoke/wander around breaks.
And jab1, I’ll tell ya, I’m not gonna feel sorry for Jon Voight next time I see Deliverance.
Was I the only one who split her viewing of Part I with the TCM (or was it AMC?) preserved American short films special? Yikes, talk about some jarring contrasts…
“Uprising” was notable for many things, but I was particularly impressed by their evocation of the Warsaw Ghetto itself. I thought they did as good a job with that as the makers of “Enemy At the Gates” [very worthy book & film there] did in re-creating wartime Stalingrad, with a large budget.
Who knows, maybe NBC will replay it in a year or two!
I’d just like to underline the fact that the underlining in my previous post was unintentional. It probably happened because “Deliverance” was underlined in the quote.
Nah, that’s cool - unless you didn’t tape the commercials. If you taped the commercials, I can wait until it comes out on video and watch it then. Thanks, tho!
