Jose Duran

The movie Remembrance: Die Verlorene Zeit is a romantic movie set during the second World War and the movie has two lovers Tomasz a Polish rebel fighter and Hannah a Jewish German women. Tomasz saves Hannah from a concentration camp as he disguises as a German officer and takes her out of the camp, they run away yet are separated by the war until they meet again in New York 30 years later. The major theme of the film is to resilience love, and to be strong as we see Hannah still hold onto Tomasz memory still searching for him. 

Time is depicted  through scenes of the past and present as we see Hannah when she was a younger woman with Tomasz and we also see her in the modern day in New York as an older woman with her new husband seeing this overlap of time shows us the progression of Hannah. We also see Tomasz in the modern day as we see him on the television and he has a daughter now showing the characters develop over time. The movie has some L and J cuts as we see j cut scenes where the audio happens first before the scene, and some scenes with the l cut having audio move onto the next scene. Mise en scene is used in the film as the scene of Tomasz mother housing the German showing that this is household, the uniform that he is wearing shows that he’s a German officer.  

The movie critiques the role of race and ethnicity by showing us the struggles of the Jewish people during the second World War as it shows us the Holocaust camp of people being persecuted by the Nazis being forced to do tough labor. The movie handles female characters by showcasing Hannah as the main protagonist showing her as a strong and brave yet feminine character showing her escape death and hide against the Nazis yet also being pregnant with a baby. The other female character that is shown is a Magdalena she is shown being independent and also a fighter against the Nazis like her male counterparts Tomasz and Czeslaw. The movie works against the gender roles showing females as brave and being able to fight back against the oppressors the movie works against gender roles by having female characters being shown as brave and independent throughout the movie.  

The director Anna Justices intention for making this movie was to showcase a romantic story taking place during the second World War having a Jewish protagonist in love with a Polish rebel being separated during the war finding each other decades after. Another purpose to show the tough experience that Jewish people suffered during this terrible time in history so people can learn from the past. My response to this movie is appreciated as it doesn’t hide any history and it addresses the problems of the past. The film compares other romantic stories taking place during historical timelines like Titanic.  

Photography of railway and station by Erica Magugliani published on January 13th, 2018 via Unsplash.com

Remembrance: Die Verlorene Zeit. (NR) dir. Anna Justice (2011); 100 mins