4/5 Amen - More bad news for the Pope
  by Rick Amazon (Hayward, CA)
I wasn't expecting much when I picked up a fictional movie about the Catholic pope's response to the Holocaust during WW2. This looked like a typical cord puller showing the zombies in the camp, moms walking with children to their death, evil crazy Nazis, yada, yada, yada.

Luckily, the director Costa-Gravis has experience with movies with political themes and undertones, Z being his most famous. Here the scenes of atrocities are indirect rather than direct. You seen trains, lots of trains, going full and returning empty. You see smokestacks burning and the emotional reactions when the real truth is known. This was done with a nice touch rather than a heavy hand.


The movie is based on a real SS mole who vainly tries to get the word out. He is in charge of army disinfection, and finds out the hard way what the poisons are really being used for. He ends up being both sympathetic (perhaps too much, considering his position) and tragic. You follow him throughout and after the war. To the bitter end.

Throughout the movie, I just sat in amazement to the lame excuses used again and again by the pope and other countries in response to the holocaust. Even when the Nazis start taking jews in the view of the vatican what does his eminence do? Take a guess. There was a lunch scene with vatican cardinals and ambassadors where all of the standard responses to do nothing are raised. They just didn't get it.


From an interview with Gavras the inevitable question of "Did they Know?" arose. "Everybody knew", he responded. And this is the rub. We are not talking about Germans here. We are talking about the people who knew from the allied side of the war. Americans, British, French. Hell, even the pope knew and they all had a reason not to respond.

Their only saving grace is that "maybe" they didn't understand the scope of the genocide. They had enough people telling them the truth, but once again, they just didn't get it. One scene that emphasizes this position is where the US ambassador is told that 10,000 jews are being killed daily. He replies, "You'll have a better chance of being believed if you say hundreds, instead.

The Catholic church made a pact with the devil called Hitler. In the beginning, they had their reasons for this pact, but when faced with the truth, they ran the other way. One priest in the movie asks "Do we want to save the Vatican or Christianity." The pope chose poorly.


3/5 Tense drama that tended to drag
  by C Wahlman (Merrillville, IN)
I hate when you can tell that a film is based on a play. I mean there are beautiful action scenes without dialogue, and then long bouts of dialogue.

I was fascinated by the subject matter of this film, and I think that this aspect of the movie was portrayed quite well. The persistence that the two main characters possess in the face of cowardice and indifference (and ignorance) was compelling. Any viewer could easily understand their desperation and frustration. And the opening scene could easily grab you immediately.

The acting was incredibly well done. And my copy was in English, a fact that I rather preferred as the content was so dense, I did not want to miss a single word, idea, or expression. The film was shot beautifully, even with scenes of some vicious crimes, it is still strikingly beautiful.

The problem I had with this film is that it tended to drag on ... I got quite easily how frustration it was to these men to persist and have tons of evidence, even an eye witness to the holocaust, and still get no where with just about everybody. But this point was hammered home so incessantly that it made for long lulls in the story line. Sorry, it is a film and should be entertaining and enlightening. A quick edit could have reduced the number of unnecessary scenes, so the impact of the film's subject matter would have been sharper.

It was a good film, beautiful and well acted, although it did drag. I still encourage all to see it (especially history buffs)--just be prepared for a dialogue driven movie that may dull you at points.

1/5 One star for Amazon's misrepresentation of this DVD
  by Perseus (OR United States)
Regardless of the merits of the film itself and the importance of the subject matter potential buyers of this DVD need to be alerted to the fact that, contrary to Amazon's blurb above, it is *not* presented in the original language. It is dubbed into English with a variety of often incongruous accents. There are no other language tracks and no subtitles.

Perhaps for many viewers this is not an imporatnt consideration, but for those who wish to watch the film in its original form, it is available from Amazon.de under its original title "Der Stellvertreter (The Deputy)". The German DVD includes an English soundtrack for those who prefer it, but also a German soundtrack with German subtitles.

5/5 A movie to be seen
  by Silvia Antonucci
Thank you very much for sending me the movie "Amen", everything was ok and the movie is really well done! Something that everyone should see!

4/5 Overall a great film
  by Heather (Illinois, USA)
This is a great film, a must have for anyone who is interested in World War II and the holocaust. It provides a different perspective and story than most World War II/Holocaust movies which is why I enjoyed it so much. The reason why it only got 4 stars by me is because it is a very long movie and can get a little slow at times. But having said that, it is a great movie, the story is enthralling, sad, and unique. It is a great addition to any history buff's DVD collection.