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Europa

Europa (1992)

May. 22,1992
|
7.5
|
R
| Drama Thriller Crime

A young, idealist American gets a job as a train conductor for the Zentropa railway network in postwar, US-occupied Frankfurt. As various people try to take advantage of him, he soon finds his position politically sensitive, and gets caught up in a whirlpool of conspiracies and Nazi sympathisers.

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Listonixio
1992/05/22

Fresh and Exciting

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Console
1992/05/23

best movie i've ever seen.

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Voxitype
1992/05/24

Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.

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Isbel
1992/05/25

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

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erik-32757
1992/05/26

What a piece of crap, as a Dane i must say, i have never understood Lars Von Trier, and after this - and all the other films he has made, the past 45 years - i never will.

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Dickhead_Marcus_Halberstram
1992/05/27

Lars von Trier's Europa is a worthy echo of The Third Man, about an American coming to post-World War II Europe and finds himself entangled in a dangerous mystery.Jean-Marc Barr plays Leopold Kessler, a German-American who refused to join the US Army during the war, arrives in Frankfurt as soon as the war is over to work with his uncle as a sleeping car conductor on the Zentropa Railway. What he doesn't know is the war is still secretly going on with an underground terrorist group called the Werewolves who target American allies. Leopold is strongly against taking any sides, but is drawn in and seduced by Katharina Hartmann (Barbara Sukowa), the femme fatale daughter of the owner of the railway company. Her father was a Nazi sympathizer, but is pardoned by the American Colonel Harris (Eddie Considine) because he can help get the German transportation system up and running again. The colonel soon enlists, or forces, Leopold to be a spy (without giving him a choice or chance to think about it) to see if the Werewolves might carry out attacks on the trains.Soon, Leopold is stuck in an adventure by being involved with both sides of the conflict in a mysterious and film noir-ish way, where everyone and everything is not what it seems. Its amazing to watch the naive Leopold deal with everything (his lover, the terrorists, the colonel, annoying passengers, his disgruntled uncle, even the railway company's officials who come to examine his work ethic) before he finally boils over and humorously and violently takes control. The film is endlessly unpredictable.The film stylishly shot, it always takes place at night during the winter with lots of falling snow. Its shot in black and white with shots of color randomly appearing throughout. Also, background screens displaying images that counter act with the images up front. Add Max von Sydow's hypnotic narration, and Europa becomes a dreamlike place that's out of this world.This is now a personal favorite film of mine.

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Claudio Carvalho
1992/05/28

On October of 1945, the American German descendant Leopold Kessler (Jean-Marc Barr) arrives in a post-war Frankfurt and his bitter Uncle Kessler (Ernst-Hugo Järegård) gets a job for him in the Zentropa train line as a sleeping car conductor. While traveling in the train learning his profession, he sees the destructed occupied Germany and meets Katharina Hartmann (Barbara Sukowa), the daughter of the former powerful entrepreneur of transport business and owner of Zentropa, Max Hartmann (Jørgen Reenberg). Leopold stays neutral between the allied forces and the Germans, and becomes aware that there is a terrorist group called "Werewolves" killing the sympathizers of the allied and conducting subversive actions against the allied forces. He falls in love for Katharina, and sooner she discloses that she was a "Werewolf". When Max commits suicide, Leopold is also pressed by the "Werewolves" and need to take a position and a decision."Europa" is an impressive and anguishing Kafkanian story of the great Danish director Lars von Trier. Using an expressionist style that recalls Fritz Lang and alternating a magnificent black & white cinematography with some colored details, this movie discloses a difficult period of Germany and some of the problems this great nation had to face after being defeated in the war. Very impressive the action of the occupation forces destroying resources that could permit a faster reconstruction of a destroyed country, and the corruption with the Jew that should identify Max. Jean-Marc Barr has an stunning performance in the role of man that wants to stay neutral but is manipulated everywhere by everybody. The hypnotic narration of Max Von Sydow is another touch of class in this awarded film. My vote is nine.Title (Brazil): "Europa"

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Thad McIlroy
1992/05/29

Lars is a "difficult" director, yet all of his films are pure originals -- love 'em or hate 'em. Europe (Zentropa) conveys more about the situation of Germany during and after the Second World War than I could imagine from any other director. To me, it is brilliant.Where to start?As with all of Lars' film, the photography is brilliant. The photography conveys more meaning than most U.S. films can convey with a combination of script, photography, directing and acting.As with all Lars' film, the acting is spotty. God knows how he casts his films, but it often seems to be upon a whim.Nonetheless, the scripting and overall art direction -- the vision of the filmmaker -- is so brilliant that one is left breathless. (Thad McIlroy)

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