stamatikokotas
I watched a copy of The Truce on VHS last night my mom bought it for like a doller some years ago at some video store that was going out of business. I poped it in because of my interest in films portraed during the world war two era. I figured since i saw the American actor from do the right thing (john turturro)on the cover, as the star actor that he was going to be portraying an native Italian, speaking English and i was right.Had john turturro been speaking Italian. At least to to his fellow italians this film would have been more memorable. I gave this film 3 stars for the part where it shows the Greek guy going back to his country first.And telling john turturro and the other italians that he was getting beter treatment because his country was in the united nations and that john turturro and his Italian people's had lost the war.The Greek Greek guy's character was entertaining. the story wasn't bad. I liked that map of all the direction that john turturro took. that they showed at the end. OK the Title. "The Truce" I can not pin point why this movie is called The Truce. I'm guessing because of the personall relationships john turturro has with people while he is trying to get back to italy. But it is not clear their is no clear "truce" portrayed. The part where he see's the German solder in munich and then the German soldier see's him and then the German soldier get's on his knee's and bow's to john turturro. Did that actually Happen? Anyway all i can say is i watched the whole thing.it's not that bad. it's not that good either.
vernetto
I have read "Se questo è un uomo" 15 times, and I also consider "La Tregua" as one of the most extraordinary Odysseys of our times. I can hardly find any of Levi's masterpieces in this hodgepodge of episodes, hardly connected to each other and with barely any historical explanation of the events. Several comments about god and religion reported in the movie were not even present in the book, giving the impression that the director wanted to twist Levi's thought to serve his own philosophical agenda. The movie relies too much on images and too little on Levi's own considerations. Some effort has been put in trying to represent the chaotic world of those times, but I would have appreciated less scenic representation and more intimate comments.
mahajanssen
I watched this during the Liberation Day weekend along with 4 other Holocaust-themed movies so it was a bit of a challenge. The movie was good enough but the dialogue was rather chaotic. You had the Russians speaking Russian and the Germans screaming their heads off in German but how is it that the central Italian characters spoke English? I was in Rome recently and I must say they are very seriously inadequate in English there and I doubt it was any different especially in WWII. I could understand if the lead character and the Greek spoke in English but the other Italian characters all spoke English too. Perhaps it was necessary to reach a wider audience but the authenticity wasn't there. However, the movie did show subtle signs of the various myths of the Holocaust like when Primo Levi (John Turturro) tried to sell his wares in the Polish market but was shunned against; I had heard that the Poles practically handed the Jews to the Germans on a silver plate so Primo's experience showed a little of what the Poles were really like. I thought John Turturro did a brilliant job; he was almost unrecognisable. This movie did show how it was like after the fall of Berlin; the German soldiers were made to work without food and how one of them fell on his knees when Primo Levi showed his concentration camp uniform to him. It showed very subtle signs of the Holocaust but focused more on their journey home and how they tried to cope with their newfound freedom and the fact that their peers, friends and family were all gased and they survived. It was a good movie but it could've been better.
JerryP-2
I suppose everyone has seen one or more film representations of The Holocaust, but this one is different. It focuses not on the horror of the events themselves, rather, it's main thrust is struggle to return from the nightmare.I liked the film for its apparent accuracy in location and the detail of what it was like for some of the Jews liberated from Auschwitz to find their way back to their homelands. Virtually helpless, the Jews in Primo Levi's autobiography embark on an odyssey that eventually gets them back to their homes -- at least some of them. All the more surprising is that Stalin's Soviet Union is their main benefactor throughout all of this. While this is supposed to be an autobiography, I have to wonder at some of the scenes, for example, when the train load of Jews arrives at the Munich main rail station, a former Werhmacht soldier kneels before them. In another, a Jew with barely enough food for himself, gives some bread to German POWs in Russia so that he can watch them fight over it. The irony is unmistakable.Overall, I liked the film. It's one you have to see more than once because of all the detail. It's a bit difficult to follow the dialog in part, because much of it is in the language of the people who are represented: Poles, Russians, Ukrainians, French, Germans, Italians. Not only that, but the English dialog is accented and somewhat difficult to follow.I intend to see it at least one or two more times in order to get the full effect of this very well done story.
AD
