Donald M. Ephraim Film Festival: Paradise

Description

A compelling story of three people, Olga, Jules and Helmut, whose paths cross during WWII. Olga, a Russian aristocratic and member of the French Resistance, is arrested by Nazi police for hiding Jewish children. She is sent to jail where she meets Jules, a French-Nazi collaborator who is assigned to investigate her case. Then she is shipped to a concentration camp, where she crosses paths with highranking SS officer Helmut, who once fell madly in love with her. Helmut offers her an escape. Yet as time passes, and the fate of Nazi defeat looms, Olga's notion of paradise is irrevocably changed. "Russian veteran Andrei Konchalovsky is in robust form in this richly monochrome, perspective-rotating Holocaust drama." Variety. "...persuasively acted, elegantly shot in black and white and altogether a handsome prestige period production..." Screen International. Best Director Award Venice International Film Festival; Best Screenplay Mar del Plata film festival.