Quite simply, a fascinating story unfolds before us; how a German / Jewish family from Zagreb dealt with ... well, essentially the 20.th century. The Nazis, the Italians, the Ustasha, Tito's communists. It is one of the accolades of the book and later the movie to shed some light on the story of Jewish persecution in Croatia during the German occupation. Adriana Altara's biographical book was already a bestseller, but the movie makes the many aspects of the story much more colourful and easier to grasp. To her credit, she pulls no punches and doesn't hold back, for example, about the fact that her father and pillar of his parish managed to fit several affairs into his busy schedule, or the fact that her parents more or less deported her to boarding school so that they could invest more time in their professional ambitions. This helps the plot to stay grounded, otherwise the story of the parents who started out as partisans in Jugoslavia and both had brilliant careers in Germany might have been too much to stomach.
3 Reviews
Titos Brille
prevodm26 March 2017
My recommendation from bottom of my heart. Bitter-sweet real life stories about real life people. I cried and smiled and laughed...with feeling of deep respect.
Thank you dear Adriana on sharing your family history in such easy and positive way even in quite difficult segments (like conz. camp)! Mira
Thank you dear Adriana on sharing your family history in such easy and positive way even in quite difficult segments (like conz. camp)! Mira
Good only for the family album eventually
Horst_In_Translation25 January 2020
Warning: Spoilers
"Titos Brille" or "Tito's Glasses" is a German documentary that is in all kind's of languages due to the protagonist's background. It runs for approximately 1.5 hours and was released back in 2014, so it had its 5th anniversary last year. I still remember pretty vividly how this film was in theaters back then, also the trailer especially, even if I did not see the film back then. It was a bit unusual for sure though that we have a documentary (that is not about nature, but history) at the movies here and not just at television. Sadly the film was not on a level where I agree with this release. This also has to do with Adriana Altaras, who is at the center of the film here. She is a "German" actress and takes us on a journey into her past as we find out a lot about her family here and the historic context from when they lived or were younger. I do not like Altaras really. I have seen some films with her and I think she is not a particularly gifted actress and has a tendency to play the same character in every film she is in. As for the basics, another thing I found distracting is that immediately at the beginning she introduces herself to the audience (which may have been a good idea because she is really not that famous at all despite having solid recognition value I suppose) and she says not only that she is an actress, but that she is also a director. Well, not according to imdb, so I guess these entries are missing here, but in any case they are just minor and/or not too frequent I suppose and no really prestigious subjects. By the way, the director and co-writer here is Regina Schilling and she has really "only" working in documentaries and this includes others about people successful from the German entertainment industry such as Josef Bierbichler and, most recently, perhaps her most successful work about Kulenkampff. I somehow feel these two more deserve a film made about them than Altaras. Just my opinion I guess.
Anyway, as for the contents here, I already described vaguely what this is about, basically Altaras telling us about the people with and country in which she grew up. WWe also find out she has been an actress for really long and there is an old black-and-white film, in which she was 4 or so and we see some scenes from it. It's okay, more for the other people in this film and their costumes than for Altaras, but like almost all I felt about this movie I would say here that the outcome is okay to show at family reunions to your beloved ones and everybody else, but for a really general audience the film is never interesting enough. They tried to combine the sometimes funny route including little anecdotes (there is even a joke about Jewish grandmothers and pitbulls) with historic context. One example for the latter would be when we meet Altaras' aunt (I think), who was really stunning back in the day and still looks fine given her age, but even in these moments the things that stay most in the mind are the personal things (like the man she was married to and why) than really anything that could make a difference for people not associated with Altaras' family. What was surprisingly more interesting to me was to see the foreign country in here. They did an okay job with cinematography and the locations they picked. But this does not make up for all the mediocrity I'd say. This also applies to Altaras' emotional breakdown and the tears near the end, which to me seemed staged and scripted, but well maybe I am wrong, like I said I am generally not too fond of the actress, so it is at least partially a subjective position. I am pretty sure though I would have liked the film more with another actress at the center. If you like her, then you can still watch it. Don't get me wrong: I have absolutely nothing against Jews or so, on the contrary actually, I find it really worrying how they are attacked by radical Muslims on a regular basis these days all over the world, so I think that actually the film could have been truly interesting to me because I care a lot about Jewery, also about films about the Nazi years and WWII, but yeah I guess it shouldn't be. I will still end the review on a high nore by saying I quite like the Bella Ciao song that played right at the start and also closely before the closing credits rolled in. The film itself gets a thumbs-down from me though, even if it is definitely not a failure. It just never becomes as good, let alone memorable, as it could have been and that it apparently also takes itself really seriously is not helping at all either.
Anyway, as for the contents here, I already described vaguely what this is about, basically Altaras telling us about the people with and country in which she grew up. WWe also find out she has been an actress for really long and there is an old black-and-white film, in which she was 4 or so and we see some scenes from it. It's okay, more for the other people in this film and their costumes than for Altaras, but like almost all I felt about this movie I would say here that the outcome is okay to show at family reunions to your beloved ones and everybody else, but for a really general audience the film is never interesting enough. They tried to combine the sometimes funny route including little anecdotes (there is even a joke about Jewish grandmothers and pitbulls) with historic context. One example for the latter would be when we meet Altaras' aunt (I think), who was really stunning back in the day and still looks fine given her age, but even in these moments the things that stay most in the mind are the personal things (like the man she was married to and why) than really anything that could make a difference for people not associated with Altaras' family. What was surprisingly more interesting to me was to see the foreign country in here. They did an okay job with cinematography and the locations they picked. But this does not make up for all the mediocrity I'd say. This also applies to Altaras' emotional breakdown and the tears near the end, which to me seemed staged and scripted, but well maybe I am wrong, like I said I am generally not too fond of the actress, so it is at least partially a subjective position. I am pretty sure though I would have liked the film more with another actress at the center. If you like her, then you can still watch it. Don't get me wrong: I have absolutely nothing against Jews or so, on the contrary actually, I find it really worrying how they are attacked by radical Muslims on a regular basis these days all over the world, so I think that actually the film could have been truly interesting to me because I care a lot about Jewery, also about films about the Nazi years and WWII, but yeah I guess it shouldn't be. I will still end the review on a high nore by saying I quite like the Bella Ciao song that played right at the start and also closely before the closing credits rolled in. The film itself gets a thumbs-down from me though, even if it is definitely not a failure. It just never becomes as good, let alone memorable, as it could have been and that it apparently also takes itself really seriously is not helping at all either.
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