The Edukators/Die Fetten Jahre Sind Vorbei (2004) - Strong character portrayals elevate Weingartner's idealistic drama

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The three young idealist stars of Hans Weingartner's The Edukators stand and observe us against a wall on this poster for the film

Two anti-capitalist activist comrades break into rich people's homes and move around their belongings and leave messages. But as a girl enters between them, and they kidnap a businessman, their friendship and political idealism is put to the test.

The Edukators, written by Katharina Held (Free Rainer (2007)) and co-writer-director Hans Weingartner (The White Sound/Das Weiße Rauschen (2001)), is something as rare as a revolutionary, modern film.
Perhaps fitting for its subject, young socialist activists, it is shot with handheld digital cameras which denies the film aesthetically pleasing film qualities. The result, however, is that The Edukators is an ugly watch. - Except for the pleasantness of the three both beautiful and very well-playing leads, portrayed by Daniel Brühl (A Most Wanted Man (2014)), Julia Jentsch (The Murder Farm/Tannöd (2009)) and Stipe Erceg (Operation Libertad (2012)).
They make The Edukators, - which is the name they take as an activist group, - captivating. I didn't personally sympathize with their characters' actions, but they succeeded in making me sympathize with them as characters, which is another thing, and a very valuable one.
The Edukators is a thought-provoking and idealistic debate movie-political drama romance.

Watch a scene from the film here

Cost: 250k €, equaling approximately 309k $
Box office:  Reportedly 8.1 mil. $
= Mega-hit
[The Edukators premiered 17 May (Cannes Film Festival) and runs 127 minutes. Weingartner has stated that the film reflects his own past as a political activist and experience in a love triangle. He has also claimed that he was offered a big US studio budget, but that he preferred to take a 250k € loan, using his parents' home as collateral, to make the film on a low budget. Shooting took place in Germany, including Berlin, Austria, Spain and France. The film opened #70 in 2 theaters to a 10k $ first weekend in North America, where it peaked at #57 and in 19 theaters and grossed 175k $ (2.2 % of the total gross). The film's biggest 3 markets where its native Germany with 4.5 mil. $ (55.6%) from almost 890k audiences, native Austria with 0.4 mil. $ (4.9%) and the UK with 269k $ (3.3 %). The listed markets at Box Office Mojo only comes to 5.7 mil. $, so several grosses are missing, if the 8.1 mil. $ world gross listed is accurate. The film was nominated for a European award, won 2/3 German Film awards, among other honors. It has inspired activists in Germany - to steal food and give to the poor in 2006 - and the US - where a statue was stolen from Bernie Maddoff in 2009 and returned signed The Edukators. A US remake was in talks with Brad Anderson helming it, but it has never come to fruition. Weingartner returned with Free Rainer (2007). Brühl returned in Ladies in Lavender (2004)); Jentsch in Downfall/Der Untergang (2004) and Erceg in Don't Look for Me/Such Mich Nicht (2004). The Edukators is fresh at 69 % with a 6.5 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of The Edukators?

Cabaret (1972) - Liza Minnelli steals (nearly) the whole great show in Fosse's classic musical

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The classic poster for Bob Fosse's Cabaret

QUICK REVIEW:

Berlin, 1931: In the Kit Kat Club, American Sally Bowles performs in the burlesque show with her daring song and dance acts. She and Brian, the bisexual from Cambridge, develop a close relationship.

Liza Minnelli (New York, New York (1977)) is wonderful (and quite often "desperate"), and Michael York (The Island of Dr. Moreau (1977)) probably has the best character of his entire career here in Bob Fosse's (All That Jazz (1979)) classic, erotic, romantic, dramatic musical.
Nazism is haunting Weimar-republic Germany in this period, and the way it creeps into the decadent bohemian lifestyle in Berlin is portrayed piercingly to an often bloodcurdling effect.
Some of Cabaret's wilder impulses and its somewhat loose ending aren't necessarily that successful, and Sally Bowles and the motto of the film, (that life is nothing but a cabaret), are, evaluated soberly, amoral and bordering on twaddle. And yet ...
Cabaret is an undeniable classic. With glorious pictures by English cinematographer Geoffrey Unsworth (2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)), authentic period atmosphere, (the film was shot in Germany), and magnificent performances.

Expressionist-style poster for Bob Fosse's Cabaret

Watch the trailer here

Cost: Est. 2.2 - 6 mil. $
Box office: 42.7 mil. $
= Huge hit
[Cabaret was a smash hit critically and commercially; it won 8 Oscars, making it historically the film that has earned most Oscars without getting Best Picture, (it lost that and Best Adapted Screenplay to The Godfather (1972). Among others Fosse, Minnelli and Unsworth were honored with Oscars, as well as Joel Grey (Kafka (1991)), who plays the vivacious emcee.]

What do you think of Cabaret?
What's your favorite musical and why?

The Human Beast/La Bête Humaine/Judas Was a Woman (1938) or, Train of Love, Lust and Murder!

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Impressionistic style dramatic poster for Jean Renoir's La Bête Humaine

QUICK REVIEW:

In La Bête Humaine, we get involved in a ménage a trois, whereof one character is really more furtive and unsympathetic than the next, and yet French master director Jean Renoir (The Rules of the Game (1939)) succeeds in making endearing characters out of at least two of these, the two played by Jean Gabin (Le Grande Illusion (1937)) and Simone Simon (Cat People (1942)). The latter is as sweet as honey and as dangerous as a true femme fatale simultaneously in this fine pre-WWII adaptation.
SPOILER The finalizing murder is shocking and took me unawares, and it comes on top of a mildly speaking oddly arranged start and middle.
The train, where most of the film plays out, has been described as the fourth main character in the film, and it was what set off the production, as Gabin was looking to make a train picture. Personally, I share Gabin's fondness for the train locale in films, and this only heightened my enjoyment of Renoir's Émile Zola (La Joie de Vivre (1884)) adaptation La Bête Humaine ('The Human Beast'), which is truly a dark and troubling film. Its timing right before the terrible waste and bloodsheds of WWII feels eerily appropriate.

The train motif adorns this cover of Zola's book

Budget: Unknown
Box office: Unknown
= Unknown

What do you think of this dark triangle of love, lust and murder?
What other fine train movies do you remember?