User Reviews

The DVD for this film has the English-dubbed version only--you cannot watch the film in its original German. There are captions, but they are simply parroting the dubbing. So, I have no idea how close the captions and dubbing are to the original film. However, it's a bit odd at first seeing Horst Buchholz and Gert Fröbe speaking without their normal voices--as both spoke English well and appeared in many English-language films.

The film begins with Buchholz being released from prison. Apparently he is a reporter and was jailed for sneaking into Spandau Prison and interviewing several war criminals. Now released, his reputation is poor and he accepts a job ghost-writing for a famous reporter who pays him very well. Buchholz practically worships his new boss and his unquestioned faith in the man will cause a serious problem. That's because his boss is less than scrupulous and concocts a crazy story about a small group of German soldiers who were trapped in a cave filled with provisions for over a decade! And, to make this fantastic story worse, when people question it, the boss just makes the story wilder and wilder. Things spiral more and more out of control--at which point Buchholz finally realizes the truth. What is he to do?!

In many, many ways this is like a German version of the great Billy Wilder film "Ace in the Hole". Both are super-cynical films about the power of the press and the gullibility of the public. While "Ace" is clearly a better film, "Wet Asphalt" is very, very good....just not quite as cynical. Exciting...I sure wish I could have seen the original German language version with subtitles.

"Nasser Asphalt" is a West German German-language movie in black-and-white from 1958, so this one will have its 60th anniversary soon and it stars some of the biggest names from Germany from that time. Rising star Horst Buchholz and Martin Held both received German Film Award nominations for their performances in this 90-minute movie. The female main role is played by Maria Perschy, but sadly, the longer the film goes the more her character becomes insignificant in the face of the two "heroes". And it all seems so different at the beginning. It almost seems like a triangle relationship drama early on, but the film turns more and more into another shot at Germany dealing with World War II guilt (after all, it was the 1950s) and an interesting little tale on how press has a major impact on people's lives. The fact that we should not believe everything we are told is more than relevant today as well, even if so much time has gone. Other than that, Held carries the film strongly as the major antagonist to the protagonist played by Buchholz and Buchholz is pretty strong too. I can see why he got compared to the young James Dean and Marlon Brando. Probably the most gifted German actor from his age group at that point. Strong screen presence and above-average range for such a young man. But even in the face of these two strong performances, the heart and should of the film stays the story about a fake news article and what major (even diplomatic) complications arise from it. 1950's Germany was not exactly known for great filmmaking, but here director Frank Wisbar and writer Will Tremper show the inferior competition how it's done profoundly. I certainly recommend the watch. "Wet Asphalt" is a success.

DVD Review "Wet Asphalt" By Marcus Pan

From the "lost noir" category of Dark Sky Films' new releases, "Wet Asphalt" portrays the story of prison releasee Greg Bachmann (Horst Buchholz). An early release prompted by Cesar Boyd (Martin Held), mogul oldster reporter of the day, places Bachmann as personal assistant and helpful reporter protégé to the older mogul. During the course of his work, in an effort to build sensationalism for his stories, Boyd makes the grave error of developing a story not from a news source, but his mind.

The result resembles something you'd see during the Telephone Game - where you'd tell a story at one end of a chain of people and by the time it reaches the others at the end of the line it's been extremely exaggerated. The creation of this story, which ends up in a Parisian newspaper on the weekend, builds to include other reporters picking up the idea. This leads other reporters to add new details, to the point where the governments of multiple nations are attempting to safeguard against a possible international event.

During the course of young Greg's investigation into this story he helped Boyd write up, he is lead to the discovery of the story's initial fabrication. Being an honest type, the idea of concocting a story for mere sensationalism and passing it off as "news" terribly upsets Bachmann. Watching the story take on a life of it's own, build to a crescendo and result in people being hurt through riots and demonstrations, with Boyd not showing the least bit of remorse for it, sends Bachman over the edge. The result is his quest to expose the fallacy of the story.

The movie brings forward many ideas and questions concerning media and its practices and those morals still stand and should be practiced as much today as it was back when this movie came out - 1958. That helps the movie remain timeless, as it echoes an ideal that has been wrestled with for many years and since newsmen have begun to write about the world at large.

The audio track was a bit off, but this is to be expected when you're dealing with a film nearly a half century old. Other than that, the movie stands as a good example of the genre and asks some very important questions about truthfulness in news media and sources. Somebody send a copy of this to CNN and all the other news programs as a reminder.

--- Originally published in Legends #154. Minor edits since.