Too much of everything

Pretty Good

It's funny, it's tense, it features two great performances from two actors and the director expertly creates a web of odd tension where you actually don't know what is happening for the majority of the run time.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

This film is certainly worthwhile for a serious student of movie history, given its circumstances. The first film released in post WW-II Germany, etc...Yes, the plot line development is predictable from the midpoint of the film onwards. And sure, there are the side-stories regarding post-war German guilt and apologia and its role in the making of this film. I'll give you all of that.But the reason a movie lover wants to watch this film is two-fold. One, the stark B/W cinematography of this film is deeply affecting and very unique for the time period. And two, the wonderful, sublime beauty of a young Hildegard Knef. She is so fragile in this film, it's a real contrast with her later persona of the German song chantreuse of the 60s.It's hard to find this movie on DVD, but it's out there. If you find it to buy or rent, give it a watch, well worth the time. 8/10 rating.

This is a very strange movie. It starts with the text insert "Berlin, 1945", which translated to "the same place, but last year" at the time and place of filming. Although Berlin sure was in ruins at the time, everything seems so neat, cosy and tidy here -- it made me wish for those happy days of being bombed out and living hand-to-mouth. Susanne, the concentration camp survivor, is perfectly made up and groomed in every scene. When she returns from the camps and finds the alcoholic misanthrope Dr Mertens squatting in her flat, she naturally falls heels over head in love with him. Dr Mertens has the fetching characteristic of never having to worry about food or fuel, and being able to party every day in nightclubs despite being pennyless. Strangely, most films that came years later managed to paint a more realistic picture of the post-war chaos than the film that was filmed right in the thick of it. There is also a somewhat overwrought old man, Mondschein, waiting for the return of his son from the war.The movie finally gains momentum when Mertens encounters his former commander, Ferdinand Brückner, who on Christmas eve only a few years ago ordered the execution of a hundred civilians. Brückner is an unscrupulous, jolly bastard, who has always managed to stay on top and is now already a successful entrepreneur. Compared to the other rather ethereal characters of the story, he is truly creepy because he is realistic, remorseless -- and strangely likable. In the original plot, Mertens eventually avenges himself and murders Brückner, but in order not to promote lynch justice, the movie takes a more moderate and open ending.The movie is very courageous in that it doesn't aim to entertain or send out a positive vibe, but confronts the uncomfortable past head-on and dares to hold up a mirror at its audience, in a way that few, if any, movies have done since. For that, and for its historic value, it deserves twenty out of ten points. Sadly it lacks a bit in suspense. On a side note, its brilliant cinematography and especially the masterly use of shadows was reciprocated in another classic that was filmed two years later, with almost an overload of suspense: The Third Man.

One part romance, one part thriller, and all parts beautifully crafted, "Die Mörder sind unter uns" is an amazing film that shows what happens to good people when they have to rebuild their lives after traumatic events. This movie resonates with symbolism and is imbued with an almost dream-like quality. But do not be fooled, in a certain way, this movie is about breaking dreams and skin to heal the mind and body underneath.Ernst Wilhelm plays the sullen and depressed Dr. Mertens. His past occupation as an already reluctant Nazi officer keeps him from continuing his profession as a doctor, and from staying sober. Enter the beautiful and gentle Susanne, played by Hildegard Knef. Having survived her experiences within a concentration camp, though the viewer is never told what those experiences are; Susanne is intent on rebuilding her life and her war-torn apartment. Can these two broken souls heal one another? Watch for the final showdown between Dr. Mertens and his former Nazi superior, Ferdinand Brückner. This showdown, by far one of the most compelling scenes in cinema history, elegantly brings up the issue of justice and "who" is responsible after war atrocities have been committed. What's black and white and red all over? The murderers among us!

Murderers Among Us is the first film made, of a vast trove of films, in the Soviet controlled sector of post-war Germany that was to become East Germany. It is deeply and masterfully immersed in the aesthetic traditions of German Expressionism and /or Film Noir: unusual angles and picture planes, extreme lighting effects, twisted stairs, bombed-out buildings that look like jagged fingers against the sky (it was shot in the ruins of Berlin), a haunted, tormented protagonist, stark black and white atmosphere, and, above all, shadows. Shadows and more shadows of every size, shape, and density. In fact this film could serve as a text book on shadow craft: the scene where a man is screaming from within the vast shadow of a pistol wielding attacker is magnificent. I haven't seen The Third Man recently but I am sure Murderers influenced it profoundly. I would recommend the Third Man as a good double feature with this film.Murders belongs to a genre called 'rubble films', shot in the rubble of Germany and frequently dealing with issues of German guilt after WW II. Murderers does not seek to deal overmuch with the people who gave the orders, but with the many Germans who followed them with little or no protest. Such as the wounded doctor in this film who stood by while even children were executed as reprisals against resistance fighters in occupied Poland. Plotwise the film works quite nicely, and I liked the atmosphere of renewal, and perhaps relief at the end of a nightmare, amongst all that ruin and rubble as the German people began to pick themselves up.