Review of Swing Kids (1993) by Michael V — 13 Oct 2011

Just listen to the premise and you can clearly deduce your enjoyment of this film: teenagers in Nazi occupied Germany rebel through their obsession with swing music. On the one hand, it does have historical implications , uses accurate information to draw a clear picture of how fearful the populace was of their government, and the assimilation of the peoples into a regime.

On the other hand, most of the film strays from swing music altogether and instead delves into the role the Nazis took in indoctrinating their youth to believe in the Reich over decency. We're presented with three main characters: Peter, Thomas, and Arvid.

All enjoy swing music, though Arvid is a cripple who plays the guitar with the band, and the others dance with gusto in a local club. None of them feel direct sympathy for the Jews, but do feel hatred for the Hitler Youth, who constantly beat up swing kids and hold raids on clubs.

Peter, our main character, is pushed into joining the Youth through coercion, and Thomas does also for solidarity. The film veers into the true nature of the party, brining Peter's inner struggle to the service.

This section of the film drags quite a bit, focusing more on fear and strong persuasion to discount freedom. The performances by Leonard, Bale, and Whaley were each singularly unique, and complimented each other.

Still, their characters were too casually perfect for the formula needed: one is deadset against, one is conflicted, and one readily follows. It's too neat for me. Besides all that, the characters speak in Harlem slang, use the phrase "Swing Heil", and speak of swing music as an obsession, nothing else surely making any of them happy like it.

This wouldn't have been so strange if all the characters weren't speaking English, when it's set in Germany, and the main evil doer played by Kenneth Branaugh didn't have a British accent.

It was too much fluff in a film that should have been more about teenage rebellion, and less about taking society down with dancing, because that's all the movie is: dancing. Too strange for my blood.