Paul Verhoeven, president of the Jury of the 67th International Berlin Film Festival, gestures as he poses for media during a photo call at the 2017 Berlinale Film Festival in Berlin, Germany, Thursday, Feb. 9, 2017. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber)
By KIRSTEN GRIESHABER - Associated Press - Thursday, February 9, 2017
BERLIN (AP) - A French film about a jazz guitar virtuoso who struggled under the Nazis kicked off the Berlin International Film Festival on Thursday, the first of the year’s major European movie fests.
“Django,” from first-time director Etienne Comar, is the first of 18 movies competing for the festival’s top Golden Bear award.
The film, inspired by the story of guitarist Django Reinhardt, portrays the Gypsy musician’s life in France under Nazi occupation in 1943. Even as many Roma across Europe were being persecuted and killed in the Nazis’ death camps, Reinhardt initially believes that his fame will save him. He plays his guitar in sold-out concert halls in Paris, enjoying his popularity.
“The freedom which music gives you in complex times is the topic of this film,” Comar told reporters.
However, as the story progresses, the Nazis’ pressure on Reinhardt grows.
He refuses to go on a tour to Germany to serve the Nazis’ propaganda machine, but is later forced to play in front of German officers in France. The Gypsy village where he stays after leaving Paris gets burned down and in the end he runs for his life, leaving behind his pregnant wife and mother to escape across the Alps to Switzerland.
read more at: http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2017/feb/9/berlin-film-festival-kicks-off-with-django-reinhar/
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