Reviews

This is a wonderful documentary about the history of infomercials, it is fun to watch. It's great to see some familiar faces of 1990s infomercials, telling their stories of how they got started in the business, and the art of the pitch. Being a product demonstrator is no easy job--we learn what is involved in working, for example, a State Fair: the preparation, the long hours, the lengthy scripts that must be committed to memory. It is also fascinating to hear these guys and gals talk about how to sell things, in a way they are the ultimate salesmen, they are actors whose "applause" is people handing over money.

I didn't realize that the infomercial existed back in the 1950s, at some point they became too expensive to air, but with the advent of Cable TV, and some deregulation, they came back sometime in the 1980s, and by the 1990s they were all over the place. The documentary also traces the origins of pitchmen to the old traveling snake oil salesmen, and even earlier--for how long have human beings been selling things to each other? Ron Popeil did not agree to participate in the film, but we learn through his relatives Lester Morris and Arnold Morris about the background of their products empire.

If you get a kick out of infomercials, you'll love this film. But even if you hate them, I think you will find the film entertaining, informative, well organized and well edited.

I'm surprised that this documentary isn't better known--it really is good.

For historical significance this movie deserves more than a 7, but one should rate movies based on how much one actually liked the movie, thus my 7 rating. (This still means I liked and recommend the movie!) I watched this after seeing Frank Beyer's "Jakob the Liar," and I think "Naked Among Wolves" is the better film. One of my nit-picks with these films is that the harshness and brutality of life in the ghetto or concentration camp is not fully revealed. The films are products of their times, I suppose. And one cannot make actors look like skeletons. The most brutal portrayal of the holocaust I have seen (in a non-documentary) is in the TV mini-series "War and Remembrance." Neither of Beyer's films comes close. Again, I'm sure that there was so much an East German film director in the 1960's and 70's could do. That criticism out of the way, I think that "Naked Among Wolves" is a fine film with interesting characters and performances.

This move has a very powerful ending, but unfortunately it is a chore to get there. The script and many of the characters aren't all that interesting. The acting is mixed--Manuela Simon, who plays Jacob's ten-year old (or so) niece, out-acts them all, except for of course Vlastimil Brodský (Jacob) and Erwin Geschonneck (Kowalski) who do give fine performances. There is nothing notable about the other performances. The film moves along at a stagy, slow pace. The deprivations of life in the Ghetto are not fleshed out. Same with the brutality of the Nazis. This makes the film seem at best ungenuine and at worst dishonest. But the powerful ending makes up for it all. However, I wish there had been more interesting drama along the way. There's no tension in the film at all. It reminded me a bit of Gus Van Sant's "Elephant," where we see the mundane, somewhat boring day in the life of some high school students--it moves at a snail's pace, but that's what makes the ending especially shocking and disturbing. Also in Jacob the Liar there are some (in my opinion unsuccessful) attempts at humor. But the subject of the film is no laughing matter. So I have a lot of nits to pick with this film, but I'll be haunted by the ending forever. forever.