Patty Bergen is a teenager in a Jewish family living in the American South during World War II. Patty feels like an outcast even in her own family and is unable to understand why her father can't seem to love her. Her town eventually becomes host to a prisoner of war camp. A young German soldier escapes from this camp, and Patty finds him hiding in her secret place in the woods outside of town. After getting to know him, she ends up harboring him from his captors and, in the way of many adolescents, falls in love with him. Patty knows what she is risking by helping him, but in his company, she feels important, special, and respected as she has never been. In the end, his regard lifts her self-esteem and helps her to face the heartbreaking events to come.
Reviews
Fresh and Exciting
Don't listen to the negative reviews
As Good As It Gets
Pretty good movie overall. First half was nothing special but it got better as it went along.
This movie was one of the best I have ever seen. Just the other day I was reminded of this movie by something on TV. It came back to me like a dam flooding over. I have never been more touched by a movie than by this one. After the movie was over I actually could not quit crying for about 2 hours. No movie has ever moved me that way before. I was 15 at the time of the movie and have not seen it since but am hoping I can find a copy to buy so that I can watch it whenever I want to. If someone suggests you see this movie with them, GO....you will not be disappointed.Peggy Fries
I did not read the original book, so I can't say if the movie stuck to it or not, but I'm always looking for continuity bloopers in films. Every movie has at least one, and it's fun to look for them.Here's a blooper for you: when Anton decides not to escape on the freight train and he is surprised by Patty, there is a scene where they stand facing each other while the train passes by in the background. Just for a moment, on one of the freight cars, a plaque, about 1 foot by 2 feet, is visible. On it is a series of colored horizontal lines of varying lengths. This plaque is actually a laser-readable bar code, which contains the serial number of the freight car, its dimensions and capacities, and the name of the railroad it belongs to. A laser would read each plaque as the train rolled past a freight-yard checkpoint.These plaques were invented by IBM in the late 'sixties and were introduced in 1970. They are the ancestors of the Universal Product Code, the bar codes we all know and love today, introduced in 1974.But, this movie is set in 1943 or 1944. Oops!
I would catch this cornball melodrama years ago and its ridiculous attempts at confronting discrimination and racism and showing love can conquer better than war or hate is as preachy and as alienating as the most disapproving image of Mother Superior or any other kind of Catholic priest or charismatic evangelist. Other posts have relayed what the story was about. I can honestly say I didn't catch on to it being a wonderful love story, that's for sure.McNichol and Davison were hardly a sweet teen romance. I recall Constantine's quiet "youre dead to me" comment to McNichol, but McNichol would also scream at all those around they were murderers when the escaped German prisoner was shot and killed. Talk about cheesy angst, over and over again with this thing. But I guess the funniest moment for me was at the very end with Anne Haney, the elderly lady perhaps best known for her final appearances in "Mrs. Doubtfire" when Robin Williams shoved his face in that cake, and she was in "Liar, Liar" with Jim Carrey as his assistant. Haney is a gossipy neighbor lady, representing society at large in this one woman.As McNichol and her only ally, it seems, Esther Rolle (who won a supporting actress Emmy for this thing) are walking down the streets, enduring all the glaring stares of disapproval.Haney spews out the most incredible slur I think I have ever heard, "Jew Nazi n*gg*r lover."I was totally confused how one could be a Jew lover and a Nazi lover as one was killing the other in WWII, when this movie was taking place. Where on Earth did the Jew figure into it? Rolle would then deliver a tirade on Haney "leave this child be!" which of course would be highly unlikely for a Black woman to talk to a white woman like that in the forties, as anyone who checks out Oprah Winfrey's imprisonment in "Color Purple" will see. This movie was alot of wishful thinking; that people could speak so freely and that others would be silenced so easily. Unfortunately all it does is more dividing of the masses, leaving society as a whole back at square one, if we are to believe the messages here.
We read the novel Summer of my German Soldier in school and then we watched the film.If you have read the book before you saw the movie,like I did,you might feel a bit more disappointed.The feelings weren't shown as intensely as the book shows them.Also the relationships are not as clearly shown as the book.But it is still a good film to watch if you have not read the book.
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