The Shop on Main Street
1965 ‘Obchod na korze’ Directed by Ján Kadár, Elmar Klos
Synopsis
Slovakia during WW2. Tono lives a poor life, but the authorities offer him a take over the Jewish widow Lautman's little shop for sewing material.
Popular reviews
MoreRecent reviews
More-
Good performances from the two leads, especially the one who played the half-deaf, mostly senile old Jewish woman. Interesting "what would you do" situational movie.
-
In WWII Czechoslovakia the Nazis are taking over all Jewish-owned businesses. A man is offered a job by his brother-in-law to be the Aryan comptroller of a rundown button shop. The shop is owned by an elderly Jewish widow who is deaf and knows nothing about what is happening. The man realizes that the job will not pay much so he is offered money by the shopkeeper's friends in order to prevent her from being exterminated. A heartbreaking masterpiece.
-
Overly long, but an interesting relationship between two characters who become very multifaceted. Not to give anything away, but the payoff is worth the wait.
-
People, objects, and places, no matter how ideologically opposed, are connected through a camera whose gaze can't help but cast a judgmental eye after 120 minutes of idly observing varying levels of injustice. The Shop on Main Street is, at once, both the most impressionistic (City Lights reference?) and morally divided Holocaust tale I've ever seen; for that, it can only stand as one of the most "affecting," excuse the simple-but-appropriate terminology.
-
I couldn't get into it, although I'm not sure it was the film's fault. Maybe I've become less able to surrender my own mood to a film in my advancing age... an unsettling thought.
-
I had been wanting to see this for a long time, thanks to the very high PSI, and it more than delivered. A Foreign Picture Oscar-winner and a truly awesome film that everybody should see. With very well-judged performances by the two leads and wonderful direction, this is probably the best film I've discovered in years. Seek it out immediately!
-
It's an Academy Award winning foreign movie where my grandpa plays a role of a barber :)