Buddy Elias Movies
The fortunes of a family of Hungarian Jews are followed over the course of nearly 150 years in this epic historical drama, with leading man Ralph Fiennes playing three different roles. The story begins in the late 18th century, as Aaron and Josefa Sonnenschein (the name means "Sunshine" in German) die in an explosion while making an herb tonic for sale in their village. Their son Emmanuel (David de Keyser), the only survivor of the tragedy, travels to Budapest, carrying the recipe for the medicine with him. He's able to parlay the formula into a successful business, and Emmanuel and his wife Rose (Miriam Margolyes) raise two sons, Ignatz (Ralph Fiennes), who becomes a successful lawyer, and hot-tempered Gustave (James Frain). The Sonnenscheins also make room in their home for Valerie (Jennifer Ehle), but Emmanuel and Rose become furious when Valerie becomes romantically involved with Ignatz. Eventually, Valerie and Ignatz raise two children, Istvan (Mark Strong) and Adam (Ralph Fiennes), and the family changes its name to Sors in hopes of avoiding the anti-Semitism sweeping Europe. In time, Adam goes so far as to convert to Catholicism, and he marries another Catholic, Hannah (Molly Parker). He soon begins an affair with his brother's wife, Greta (Rachel Weisz), who is unable to persuade Adam to leave as the Nazis rise to power. Adam and Hannah have only one son, Ivan, who is fated to watch his father die in a concentration camp; as Ivan grows to adulthood (now played by Ralph Fiennes), he swears revenge on the forces of fascism and embraces Communism. Ivan throws in his lot with Communist leader Andor Knorr (William Hurt), but a liaison with the wife of a party official (Deborah Kara Unger) leads Ivan to tragic consequences and a jail term. In time, Valarie and Gustave are reunited at the family's estate as the only two members of the Sonnenschein clan who survive to witness the Hungarian Revolution in 1956. Hungarian director Istvan Szabo co-wrote Sunshine's original screenplay in collaboration with American playwright Israel Horovitz. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi
- Starring:
- Ralph Fiennes, Rosemary Harris, (more)
This drama, set during WWII, was co-written by acclaimed playwright George Tabori and features the writer as both narrator and an observer during the filming of incidents from his mother's life. Elsa Tabori (Pauline Collins) is a polite and dignified woman who believes that if you do as you're told, things will work out for you. However, she lives in Budapest in the midst of Nazi occupation, and Elsa's optimism hardly seems practical when one is forced to wear a yellow Star of David. When Elsa witnesses the grim fate of Maria (Natalie Morse), a gentile who made the mistake of visiting a Jewish friend as the police were rounding up victims to be shipped to a concentration camp, she discovers that cooperation is no guarantee of safety -- and that she must find a way to save herself before she's sent to her death. Fate, however, soon intercedes in an unexpected display of benevolence. This was director Michael Verhoeven's third film concerning the holocaust in Europe, following Das Schreckliche Madchen and Eine Unheilige Liebe. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi
- Starring:
- Pauline Collins, Ulrich Tukur, (more)
- 1986
In this comedy thriller, the words of the title Bang! You're Dead! are what anyone with a computer and foolish enough to let the mad scientist in this film gain access to it is likely to see, before something ingeniously awful happens to him. The scientist met an American schoolteacher at the Frankfurt airport as she was arriving to participate in a convention for teachers of German. Almost immediately, she gets embroiled in a series of adventures, beginning with the scientist having a heart attack, being taken in hand by emergency services, and then recovering sufficiently to give them (and her) the slip. She then encounters the doctor's assistant, who knows he is up to no good, and plans to find him and thwart his plan to wreak mayhem via computer. ~ Clarke Fountain, Rovi
- Starring:
- Ingolf Lück, Rebecca Pauly, (more)
- 1985
A little slow-paced and cliched for most viewers, this children's film is about a bear (impersonated) named Paul who loves bananas but hates being cooped up in his circus cage. Determined to see the wide world, Banana Paul takes advantage of an off-guard moment to close the door on his trainer -- now locked in the cage -- and take off on a motorcycle he has learned to ride in his circus act. The sudden appearance of a bear on a motorcycle has the good citizens of the town in an uproar, except for a little girl who likes the renegade beast and is somehow the only one who realizes the bear can talk. If only the police and the town's officials had her insight...
~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi
~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi
- Starring:
- Martin Lüttge
- 1981
Felix Stamm (Emil Steinberger) works at a match-making company that uses videotapes to bring together prospective couples. His gets more personally involved in his job than he would like, as he and his girlfriend Regula Koller (Franziska Oehme) find their own relationship affected by the people he meets through his work. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi
- Starring:
- Hilde Ziegler
- 1980
- R
In a true story beginning in the year before the outbreak of WW II in France, Charlotte (Birgit Doll), a young woman sent to the safety of her grandfathers in the south of France by her Jewish family in Germany, starts to paint pictures that recall some of the terrors she has already known in Germany before leaving. The movie slips back and forth between the memories her paintings conjure up, and her life in France. At first, back in Germany, Charlotte was convinced that her own optimistic, romantic outlook would save her from all harm. But then that self-deception fades a little as her father, a doctor, is picked up by the Gestapo. Even though her father's release is finally secured by Charlotte's step-mother (an opera singer), the situation steadily deteriorates until her parents send her away in the hope that she will be better off in France. Once there, the harsh reality intrudes so much on her life that not even her paintings can afford her any solace. Her despair becomes stronger as the Nazi atrocities begin to multiply, affording her little real hope of survival. An epilogue to the movie tells the audience the fate of the real Charlotte, since the movie ends before that time. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi
- Starring:
- Birgit Doll, Derek Jacobi, (more)
- 1979
- R
This expensive production attempts to bring Nobel Prize-winning author Isaac Bashevis Singer's subtle philosophical novel The Magician of Lublin to the screen. In the story, Yasha Mazur (Alan Arkin) is a perfectionistic turn-of-the-century Jewish stage magician, con-man and mystic, who is touring through eastern Europe, at the same time managing to progressively sabotage his own career. In nearly every town Yasha has a girlfriend, from the youthful Zeftel (Valerie Perrine), to the feisty Elizabeta (Shelly Winters). His harassed manager/impressario Wolsky (Lou Jacobi) arranges for him to have one more chance at theatrical success, which requires that he pull off the trick of a lifetime in a Warsaw theater. Reviewers, fans of Singer's works, and ordinary filmgoers all expressed disappointment in this beautifully filmed and ambitious movie, which was a box-office failure. ~ Clarke Fountain, Rovi
- Starring:
- Alan Arkin, Louise Fletcher, (more)
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