The Sorrow and the Pity
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DVD details
Actor: Anthony Eden, Georges Bidault, Marcel Fouche-Degliame, Maurice Chevalier, R. Du JonchayBrand: Image Entertainment
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Original Language); French (Original Language); German (Original Language); English (Subtitled); German (Subtitled)
Format: Black & White, DVD, NTSC, Subtitled
Picture Format: 1.33:1
Running Time: 251 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2001-04-24
Audience Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Studio: Image Entertainment
DVD Reviews of The Sorrow and the Pity
DVD Review: Humanist Filmamking at Tts Finest
Summary: 5 Stars
Marcel Ophul's The Sorrow anf the Pity (Le chagrin et la piti?) is an example of hunmaist filmmaking at its finest. Comprised of some two tears work in assembling and interviewing the survivors of France's Vichy regime and editing the material down to slightly over four hours seems to have been a herculean task.
The film interviews politicians, resistance fighters, collaborators, and ordinary farmers to give a complete picture of what life was like in the village of Clermont-Ferrand during the Nazi occupation. We get the story from many sides but unfortunately what we do not get is anyone who takes responsibility for the things that happened.
This film marks a perfect bookend to films like Shoah which capture the human costs of the Holocaust. These are events that need to be remembered and recorded so that they can never happen again.
The standard definition film is presented over two discs. The picure is a little grainy and could use some restoration. However as this film has been completely unavailable for 15 years it is good to see it in any form The dialogue is well subtitled in yellow and is quite easy to follow. The only bonus feature is the trailer which is presented on each disc.
This is a film that should be seen by any student of film or history for its historic value.
DVD Review: 3.5 stars out of 4
Summary: 5 Stars
The Bottom Line:
A documentary so ambitious and sucessful that it puts efforts like Fahrenheit 9/11 to shame, The Sorrow and the Pity is a fascinating (if long) account of the French occupation as seen through the lens of the town of Clermont-Ferraud; the film that helped destroy the myth of universal French Resistance, TSatP is recommended to any history or cinema buff.
DVD Review: Fascinating film
Summary: 5 Stars
This is a fascinating film, and one interesting thing it does is cut from the then present to the 1940s. So, for example, someone is explaining how even though they worked for the pro-Nazi Vichy government, they never realy believed in it, or took it that seriously. Then it cuts to a firebrand pro_Nazi speech they made in 1942.
The people who emerged with the most integrity, were the TV repairman who had been a Conservative Resistance leader (Codename Gaspar), George Marchais, then head of the French Communist party who said that you had to keep killing Germans or you would lose your members, and the man in dark glasses who-as a youth- had joined the Waffen SS, however you can imagine what he would have been like in 1944: killed you as soon as look at you, very chilling.
My Aunt lived under German Occupation, and while she was treated quite well by the German troops billeted in her house (who were all aged about 19 and had fingers and toes missing from Russian Winters) being occupied is a humiliating experience for anyone. The Germans would walk into your house, help themselves to what they wanted. Once they kicked a Pole to death outside the front door. There is nothing you can do. It is the feeling of utter powerlessness and humiliation that peoplem rememeber forever, and presumeably will do in places like Iraq.
DVD Review: France against itself
Summary: 4 Stars
'The Sorrow and the Pity' isn't light viewing. It is, for the most part, a dry, far-too-long documentary with a decidedly political slant. The editng is conspicuous. A self-satisfied ex-German officer occupies, in my opinion, an overly large part of the film. I think the producers of this film had to look some time to find such a stereotypical German.
Still, the film is of value. It depicts, through the mouths of participants, the terrible schisms that existed and still exist in France. Some Frenchmen clearly tried to live more-or-less normal lives during the occupation; others joined the Resistance; and still others collaborated or even joined the SS.
The Resistance fighters are primarily leftists and Communists, people the producers seem to be sympathetic with. The producers do not seriously question their motives i.e. were they fighting for Stalin or France? Through pointed questioning, it is possible to tell that they are less than sympathetic to people who tried to live through the occupation with as little trouble as possible.
To me, the most interesting character is a Frenchman who joined the SS. He appears to be a little less self-protective than most of the other people interviewed. He describes the French political turmoil of the early 1930's with the French Press stirring up trouble and high school battles between right and left wing students. He tells of the writhing French anti-semitism between the wars. He says that his parental roots were right wing and that he was especially impacted by films showing nuns and priests murdered by the Communists during the Spanish Civil War. He also tells of his admiration for the young German troops with their good behavior, moral and discipline. He joined up to become disillusioned as the Germans threw his French Charlemagne Divisions--with 7,000 SS Frenchmen--into rearguard battles fighting the Russians at the end of the war. Only 300 survived.
Other than these, we see many shots of Petain and Laval with discussions about their complicity and motives. We hear of Laval's, in particular, cooperation with the Nazis in their antisemitic endeavors.
Overall I think 'The Sorrow and the Pity' is worth watching as a historical document. I wish it had been more evenhanded but, unfortunately, such a documentary is impossible now. The protagonists are ancient or dead.
Ron Braithwaite, author of novels--"Skull Rack" and "Hummingbird God"--on the Spanish Conquest of Mexico
DVD Review: Outstanding movie. Terrible DVD
Summary: 2 Stars
OK, I want add to the other comments about the actual movie, it is great. My complaint with this is the poor quality of the DVD. It's massively letterboxed & digitized & looks like a poor quality VHS transfer. No extras. Hideous yellow subtitles, which are poor & not complete nor removable. As expensive as this package is, you would expect much better quality.
Description of The Sorrow and the Pity
A chronicle of a French city under the occupation. Director Marcel Ophuls combined interviews and archival film footage to explore the reality of the French occupation in one small industrial city, Clermont-Ferrand. He spoke with resistance fighters, collaborators, spies, farmers, government officials, writers, artists and veterans. The result is a shattering portrait of how ordinary people actually conducted themselves under extraordinary circumstances. By turns gripping, horrifying, and inspiring, Academy Award nominee "The Sorrow and the Pity" is a triumph of humanist filmmaking and a testament to the power of cinema. Before "Shoah," "Schindler's List," "The Long Way Home" and "The Last Days," there was "The Sorrow and the Pity."Often hailed as one of the greatest documentaries of all time, The Sorrow and the Pity is still astonishing long after its original release in Paris. The lengthy film (anyone who has heard it prominently referred to in Woody Allen's Annie Hall knows it's four hours long) tells the story of France under Nazi occupation by weaving together a number of interviews as well as newsreel clips and propaganda films shot by the Nazis. Director Marcel Oph?ls skillfully utilizes interviews with people who often contradict each other, so the story of France not only occupied but divided against itself emerges fully. Filmed in the late 1960s, when bitter memories still resonated, the interviews conducted by Oph?ls have great depth and are often amazing. Ordinary Frenchmen who found themselves performing heroic acts for the Resistance recall the dangers they faced while those who collaborated with the Nazis make excuses. A former Nazi officer interviewed at a wedding party in Germany pompously puts a benign face on what occurred where he was stationed; interviews with French residents utterly refute his sanitized version of the past. Beyond the interviews, the arresting archival footage chosen by Oph?ls is remarkable, such as an unsettling clip of a stand-up comedian performing before a laughing audience whose collar insignias identify them as members of the fanatical Nazi SS. The Sorrow and the Pity lives up to its reputation as being a magnificent documentary. --Robert J. McNamara
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