The Eichmann Show (2015)
Country: GB/LIT
Technical: col TV 90m
Director: Paul Andrew Williams
Cast: Martin Freeman, Anthony LaPaglia, Zora Bishop
Synopsis:
Jerusalem, 1961: the trial of Adolph Eichmann becomes the first such event to be filmed for the television cameras, and the producer hires an American Jew to direct it. However, as the latter tries to capture on camera some crack in the defendant's composure, their artistic differences threaten to unbalance the project.
Review:
Talkative docu-drama about a landmark televisual precedent; well acted, but with far too many scenes of rooms being emptied in order for two characters to have a frank discussion. It attempts to dramatise two competing imperatives: on the one hand, getting the information out there so that people will accept it; on the other, acknowledging that we are all capable of fascist behaviours. As any number of dramatic elements are namechecked and then discarded (logistical challenges regarding camera location, security from Nazi extremists, directorial conflicts), the film's earnestness and adherence to documentary truth ultimately prove its undoing, threatening to make it the most boring film ever made about the Holocaust.
Country: GB/LIT
Technical: col TV 90m
Director: Paul Andrew Williams
Cast: Martin Freeman, Anthony LaPaglia, Zora Bishop
Synopsis:
Jerusalem, 1961: the trial of Adolph Eichmann becomes the first such event to be filmed for the television cameras, and the producer hires an American Jew to direct it. However, as the latter tries to capture on camera some crack in the defendant's composure, their artistic differences threaten to unbalance the project.
Review:
Talkative docu-drama about a landmark televisual precedent; well acted, but with far too many scenes of rooms being emptied in order for two characters to have a frank discussion. It attempts to dramatise two competing imperatives: on the one hand, getting the information out there so that people will accept it; on the other, acknowledging that we are all capable of fascist behaviours. As any number of dramatic elements are namechecked and then discarded (logistical challenges regarding camera location, security from Nazi extremists, directorial conflicts), the film's earnestness and adherence to documentary truth ultimately prove its undoing, threatening to make it the most boring film ever made about the Holocaust.
Country: GB/LIT
Technical: col TV 90m
Director: Paul Andrew Williams
Cast: Martin Freeman, Anthony LaPaglia, Zora Bishop
Synopsis:
Jerusalem, 1961: the trial of Adolph Eichmann becomes the first such event to be filmed for the television cameras, and the producer hires an American Jew to direct it. However, as the latter tries to capture on camera some crack in the defendant's composure, their artistic differences threaten to unbalance the project.
Review:
Talkative docu-drama about a landmark televisual precedent; well acted, but with far too many scenes of rooms being emptied in order for two characters to have a frank discussion. It attempts to dramatise two competing imperatives: on the one hand, getting the information out there so that people will accept it; on the other, acknowledging that we are all capable of fascist behaviours. As any number of dramatic elements are namechecked and then discarded (logistical challenges regarding camera location, security from Nazi extremists, directorial conflicts), the film's earnestness and adherence to documentary truth ultimately prove its undoing, threatening to make it the most boring film ever made about the Holocaust.