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Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1
Audience Rating: PG-13 (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Binding: DVD
EAN: 9780767874991
Format: Anamorphic, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DTS Surround Sound, DVD-Video, Full Screen, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
ISBN: 0767874994
Label: Sony Pictures
Manufacturer: Sony Pictures
Number Of Items: 1
Publisher: Sony Pictures
Region Code: 99
Release Date: November 27, 2001
Running Time: 122 minutes
Sales Rank: 42017
Studio: Sony Pictures
Theatrical Release Date: 2000
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Editorial Review:
Amazon.com:
A daring comedy of ethics, Divided We Fall takes place during World War II in a small, Nazi-occupied town in Czechoslovakia. Josef and Maria, a childless couple, have withdrawn further and further from reality even as the war circles closer to their eerily quiet town. Josef's decision to sleep through a war he doesn't want to acknowledge is soon tested when the Jewish son of his former employer arrives in the middle of the night seeking refuge. David, the sole survivor from his family, escaped from a concentration camp in Poland and managed to return to the only place he knows in search of help. As they harbor David in their pantry over the next three years, Josef and Maria discover the depth of their resolve, forced to play the role of seeming collaborators in order to save themselves and David. Reminiscent more of Yugoslav filmmaker Emir Kustirica's devastating brand of black humor (Underground, Time of the Gypsies) than the saccharine Life Is Beautiful, to which it has been repeatedly compared, Divided We Fall achieves quite a lot, capturing the pervasive suspicion and betrayal of World War II through the unexpected guise of situation comedy. --Fionn Meade
Customer Reviews
Average Rating: 
Rating:  - Do the Right Thing
I have spent much of my 56 years studying the Holocaust in an amatuer effort to comprehend the incomprehensible. I have found a lot to learn in fiction as well as fact. There are a number of excellent movies with Holocaust themes. "Divided We Fall" deals with the subject through the perspective of a Czech family who hides an escaped Jewish concentration camp inmate. The film begins with a good sequence of scenes that enables us to see the changing roles and relationships between former comrades. We are focussed on one couple and their challenge to cope with the circumstances that are thrust upon them. There is suspense, romance, and a surprising amount of comedy mixed into the film. About midway through the movie (and continuing for awhile) I got the impression that "Divided We Fall" was not a great film. Good but not great because it seemed that there were too many unnecessary scenes. However, as the film began to accelerate towards its' climax, I realized that everything was coming together in a way that I hadn't anticipated. The climax and the positive examples it gave me left me with a special and warm appreciation of what the director, Jan Hrebejk, meant to share with us. Most Holocaust and related films leave me with an emptiness rather than a fullness but Hrebejk uses hatred and distrust to show us love and reliance. Watching "Divided We Fail" was a very moving experience.
Rating:  - A compelling nuanced story
This film isn't going to be like the WWII/Shoah film the average person expects. Instead of focusing on a lot of atrocities and tragedies, almost all of the focus is all on the one couple, Josef and Maria, their Jewish friend David (whose father was Josef's old boss), and Josef and Maria's collaborator friend Horst. The first five minutes of the film give us very short vignettes from 1937, 1939, and 1941, and are pretty much useless, since we're never told who these people are and what their relationship is, apart from giving the viewer an idea of how life changed from the prewar era to after the Nazi occupation of Czechoslovakia. The real meat of the story begins in 1943, when Josef and Maria agree to take in their old friend David, who has escaped from Poland after being interned in Terezin, the sole survivor of his family (the people we saw very brief glimpses of in 1939 and 1941). He came back to the old neighborhood because it's what he knows, and figured, perhaps naïvely, that surely there would be someone who would help him. At great personal risk to themselves, his old friends agree to hide him in a closet in their apartment. This is no easy matter in wartime or under occupation, not least of all because one of Josef's best friends, Horst, is of German descent and therefore profitting greatly now that his people are the ones in power. In addition to Horst's frequent unannounced (and often unwanted) visits and attempts to bed Maria, they also must deal with Horst's boss, a German commandant ... Read More
Rating: - Birth and Resurrection
I have never seen a Czech film I didn't like. This one is top drawer. A childless couple hide a Jew during WW II and the compelling aftermath. The ending is poetically just and symbolic. A must-see.
Rating: - Turning your back on a people, be they Jews, Czechs (as Britain & France did), or any people, only delays evil turning on you.
"Throughout time, whenever tyrants arose and preached a mixture of world domination and complete intolerance for most other human beings, their first targets were often a small group of people noted for giving the world monotheism, the bible and a set of basic laws that have been followed for thousands of years." "[T]yrannical regimes always seem to have one common link---their deep hatred for Jews." The words are from a Warren Kozak opinion piece (which appeared in the New York Sun August 21, 2006). It's hardly a new idea, of course, yet most of the world still seems disinclined to acknowledge it. Blatant anti-Semitism is thus not just something for Jews to worry about. All folks who champion freedom thus, in effect, ought see themselves as part Jewish themselves: either you stand with the persecuted or you are just putting off the day when you might just as likely be faced with similar persecution. That's the central point of "Divided We Fall"---"the true and bittersweet story of a Czechoslovakian couple whose village has been taken over by Nazis during World War II." When a Jewish friend escapes from German confinement and makes his way back to their common neighborhood, the couple has a choice to make. "I lived here all my life," says the man on the run in the film, "so I thought maybe someone here might help me." But what makes this film unique is the notion that non-Jews really need to wed Jews (metaphorically) to stand up against anti-Semitism; for, without a union of some sorts, they are looking for ... Read More
Rating: - Heart felt
I initally rented the film online. Fell in love with the complex human interactions to survive during WW2, and to still do what is right. The ending has a twist to it that I did not expect. I liked this one so much that I purchased my own copy. Do not let the fear of English subtitals get in your way of a great movie.
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