Like his earlier The Sorrow and the Pity, which examined the behavior of the French during the Nazi occupation, Marcel Ophuls’ The Memory of Justice expands the possibilities of the documentary motion picture in such a way that all future films of this sort will be compared to it. It is monumental, though not only because it goes on for four hours and 38 minutes. It also marks off, explores, calls attention to, and considers, tranquilly, without making easy judgments, one of the central issues of our time: collective versus individual responsibility. The starting point is an evocation of the 1946-47 Nuremberg war crimes trials, through newsreels and interviews that lead to a consideration of French tactics in the fight to keep Algeria and America in action in Vietnam. Perhaps because Ophuls himself was an exile from Nazi Germany, the son of an exile (Max Ophuls), and is married to a German woman who (in the course of this film) recalls her membership in the Hitler Youth, The Memory of Justice seems an especially personal, urgent work. VC
Section: Clásicos RestauradosD, G: Marcel Ophuls
F: Michael Davis
E: Inge Behrens
P: Hamilton Fish, Ana Carrigan, Max Palevsky
CP: Stuveysant Films, Polytel International Film
The Film Foundation. Kristen Merola
T +1 323 436 5060
E kmerola@film-foundation.org W film-foundation.com
The son of director Max Ophuls and actress Hilde Wall, he was born in Frankfurt, Germany, in 1927. He started working as assistant director in Moulin Rouge (John Huston, 1953) and Lola Montes (Max Ophuls, 1955). His titles include Banana Peel (1963), Munich or Peace in Our Time (1967), A Sense of Loss (1972), and November Days (1992).
05 May 2015
25 April 2015
25 April 2015
