Review of The Counterfeiters (2007) by Jason R — 17 Mar 2009

In 1929, Harry Alan Potamkin wrote this about war films: "There can be no pacifistic film which has a central hero, a protagonist--no matter how anti-militaristic its sentiments are. So long as there is participation, as there was in 'The Big Parade,' with the soldiers, such a film accentutates military fervor.

So long as the ominous rather than the horrible predominates... the military passion is enhanced." And in 1940, Pare Lorentz wrote: "There is no easy way to write a novel or an essay, or to produce a movie.

Thus, while I am personally in favor of the Chinese winning their own country away from the Japanese and while I personally was horrified at the Nazi invasion of Poland, I do not feel that just because a man has made a picture dealing with these subjects he has made a good movie.

" Sixty-seven years later, this movie won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Film, suggesting, perhaps, that the wisdom of the aforementioned authors was entirely for naught. Even within the Holocaust genre, "Counterfeiters" lacks the intensity of "The Grey Zone" while covering similar terrain.

No doubt we can unearth enough individual stories yet told about the Holocaust to last us until man no longer roams the earth (or has simply stopped making movies), but we don't really need any more like this one.