'Happy People' & 'Lore' Reviews

Happy People: A Year In The Taiga is a nature documentary about a community of trappers in a town in Siberia. It follows a hand full of trappers in the year long routine. Trapping from the fall into the winter, and fishing and preparation for the trapping season from spring to summer. The film is beautiful and gives a glimpse at a simpler harder life. We get a sense of this community and these people but the poignancy and depth of Herzog's usual documentary work is not present.

A pleasant interesting film that lacks a thesis. More suited for a National Geographic TV show than a feature film.

Rent It.

Lore is a Australian/German film that takes place in Germany shortly after the end of WWII. It follows Lore and her younger brothers and sisters(the children of an imprisoned SS officer) on a journey across country to their Grandmothers house. They meet Thomas, a Jew, on the road who joins them and uses his papers to provide them with safe passage.

The film is slow and vague almost to a point of making no statement at all. The characters never speak about their feelings, what they are thinking, or how they feel about each other. That wouldn't be a problem if we got to see them interact but most of the screen time is spent silently with them walking or sleeping. Lore believes what she has been taught, that Jews are bad and Hitler is a savior, but Thomas shakes her ideas of what a Jew is by helping her and siblings with seemingly no reason other than kindness.

The film goes no where, reveals nothing, and ends only because the kids finally reach their Grandmothers home. No statement is made, no ideas are truly explored, nothing goes above and beyond the film synopsis: Jew helps children of SS officer.

Don't See It.