User Reviews

"Ende der Schonzeit" or "Closed Season" is a German/Israeli co-production from 2012, so neither a particularly new movie, but also not too old and still a few years away from its 10th anniversary. It is the most known career effort so far by wriiter and director Franziska Schlotterer, which is not too surprising though because it really is her only full feature film made if we don't count the one that is being released this year and was not seen by anybody really. Seven years is a pretty long break though. If you read the description, then this could sound like another German Nazi/Jew movie to you, but it is only partially true I would say. The focus here is much more on the interhuman connections. We have a young Jewish man who flees from the Nazis and is hidden by an older couple who desperately try to have a child, but won't succeed. So they decide that the Jewish man should step in and have sex with the female that maybe she can get pregnant this way and they have somebody to take care of the farm eventually, which always seems to be the biggest concern of the man who owns it. The film is a bit predictable honestly. Everything after this decision to use him as a breeding bull (he even calls himself that one one occasion) is not too surprising. Of course there is a lot of tension when feelings get in the way of this very bizarre deal and the final outcome is that somebody tells the Nazis about the Jew and where he is hiding and he is deported to a KZ. The little plot twist who did it is also not too surprising honestly, even if it tries to be. Still it is a good movie thanks to the performances. Friedel is probably the most known cast member here thanks to his work with Haneke, but the better performances come from Hobmeier and Wagner, who admittedly also have better material to work with I guess. All three of them received awards attention though and that is good and deserving. So did Schlotterer. I also kinda like the general idea that the action many ears earlier is put inside a bit of a framework that plays in the future when a young man comes to find out about his father and the man he finds there tells him the story what was going on back then. It is never really about dramatic survival at the KZ because we know (do we?) from the start that the character of Albert survives in the end. And that is nice. This movie is not trying to be more than it should and desperately making an impact that goes beyond the script and talent involved here. Still, the Nazi presence and political tension was somewhat there all the time, at least in those moments when the focus was not on the complicated triangle between the three main characters. That one was also authentic and real the way it was written. I never felt that the dialogues had a fake tough to them or that I was watching actors and not real characters. Also pay attention to the nice use of metaphors here be it plants, animals or whatever that stand for the Jewish man and how long he may be useful for the other two and what could or could not happen them with him. So it is one of the better German films from 2012 for sure and I give it a thumbs-down overall. Don't expect greatness and you're in for a convincing 1.5 hours here. Check this one out, it is more a bit on the underseen side and deserves more attention.

This is only partly a spoiler since the film telegraphs the story in the first scene. The actual story takes place in during the war where a German farmer, Fritz, has failed to make his younger, dour wife Emma pregnant but badly needs an heir. He comes across a young Jewish man, Albert, trying to escape Germany for Switzerland. As his remote farm is a good place to hide, Fritz takes the youth in as a handyman. Similarly to Sir Clifford Chatterley he tells Emma that she needs to get pregnant with Albert, but here using a barnyard analogy: one brings the bull to the cow. Albert is also reluctant, Fritz is insistent and, as in siring a calf, he wants to watch to see that it is done correctly, the opposite of what Clifford Chatterley wanted. The couple finally relent but insist he leave the room.

However the young couple actually liked it and fortunately the farmer knows that one go does not always do the trick so they can do it again. Soon, at Emma's bidding they do it even when the farmer is not around. Emma even hides the fact that she is already pregnant so they can keep up the charade. But as her whole attitude has changed soon the whole village is aware. So it is time for him to go, but he fails to go soon enough so is turned in to the Nazis and sent to Auschwitz.

The story is told by the son Bruno that Albert, now an older man in Israel, is actually his father. Unlike the book by D. H Lawrence the sex scenes are muted so the object of this film is not to titillate but to tell a sad romantic story.