Before the Fall stars Max Riemelt as Friedrich Weimer, a talented boxer who is recruited into Napola, an elite fascist school. When his friend Albrecht Stein played by Tom Shilling commits suicide, Friedrich throws a fight to make a stand against aggression.
Riemelt is a very good choice for the leading actor in this role. He embodies the all of the graceful and powerful qualities of his youth, and brings a young future oriented feeling with him that you can feel with your heart. Schilling is also very good in his role as a sensitive youth. However, the problem in the film comes with the film's ending which although being the correct response to fascism to me is unbelievable given the setting.
What a powerful and tidy first and second act I must say. The only thing is that perhaps this school comes off a bit soft considering what was actually going on. With all of the yelling and screaming, I'm willing to bet that Napola in actuality did manage to succeed in beating out every single subtle impulse out of every single student. This might however be a true story, in which case I stand corrected. In everyone except two students then.
It seems to me to go through the many successions and trials that the film presents, the characters should logically end in a 180 degree spiritual demise, and subsequently the lead character, who through lessons of fascism, war, and aggression, should make a 180 degree turn from an innocent optimistic youth to into a war machine, a combat unit, a soldier.
This would be enough for me, but I am afraid that perhaps the screenwriter felt he had to say something positive rather than negative. This is a shame because it does take away greatly from the film in my opinion. Rather to deny the "cinematic moment" which doesn't work anyway, in order to state unequivocally the end result of such tyranny on a personal level for these Hitler youths would again in my opinion be the right choice, without re-writing the entire script. Now weather or not this is worth saying and making a film about this is another question. My answer is that if there was nothing more important to say about Fascism, then that premise alone would have been a film worth making, proving that premise in the film.
It is interesting that some films don't need premises to prove, and this could have been one of those films. These are mostly war films, such as Patton, where it seems that the universal threat and the action can subsist nicely with only an interesting plot. Other non-war films would be Breaking Away and Star Wars. These films work rather nicely without a strong underlining premise to prove.
As it stands: good to great moments, great tension in most of the film, but in the end a let down because of a weak or non-existent premise and to me an unbelievable plot.
Riemelt is a very good choice for the leading actor in this role. He embodies the all of the graceful and powerful qualities of his youth, and brings a young future oriented feeling with him that you can feel with your heart. Schilling is also very good in his role as a sensitive youth. However, the problem in the film comes with the film's ending which although being the correct response to fascism to me is unbelievable given the setting.
What a powerful and tidy first and second act I must say. The only thing is that perhaps this school comes off a bit soft considering what was actually going on. With all of the yelling and screaming, I'm willing to bet that Napola in actuality did manage to succeed in beating out every single subtle impulse out of every single student. This might however be a true story, in which case I stand corrected. In everyone except two students then.
It seems to me to go through the many successions and trials that the film presents, the characters should logically end in a 180 degree spiritual demise, and subsequently the lead character, who through lessons of fascism, war, and aggression, should make a 180 degree turn from an innocent optimistic youth to into a war machine, a combat unit, a soldier.
This would be enough for me, but I am afraid that perhaps the screenwriter felt he had to say something positive rather than negative. This is a shame because it does take away greatly from the film in my opinion. Rather to deny the "cinematic moment" which doesn't work anyway, in order to state unequivocally the end result of such tyranny on a personal level for these Hitler youths would again in my opinion be the right choice, without re-writing the entire script. Now weather or not this is worth saying and making a film about this is another question. My answer is that if there was nothing more important to say about Fascism, then that premise alone would have been a film worth making, proving that premise in the film.
It is interesting that some films don't need premises to prove, and this could have been one of those films. These are mostly war films, such as Patton, where it seems that the universal threat and the action can subsist nicely with only an interesting plot. Other non-war films would be Breaking Away and Star Wars. These films work rather nicely without a strong underlining premise to prove.
As it stands: good to great moments, great tension in most of the film, but in the end a let down because of a weak or non-existent premise and to me an unbelievable plot.