CONSENSUS #75. The Tin Drum (1979)

SYNOPSIS: "The Tin Drum" is an extremely bizarre movie about a young Polish boy who does not age. He is uncommunicative other than playing his tin drum. He and his family live in Nazi-occupied Danzig. He and his dysfunctional family go through some incidents with the war as the back drop. (I strongly suggest you go to my blog and read the summary so you can see what I am talking about.)

BACK-STORY: “The Tin Drum” is a 1979 German war movie based on the novel by Gunter Grass. The movie is set in WWII Danzig. It was directed by Volker Schlandorff. It is one of the most critically acclaimed war films of the 1970s. It shared the Palme d’Or with “Apocalypse Now” at Cannes and won the Best Foreign Language Film at the Academy Awards.

TRIVIA:  Wikipedia, imdb

1.  The movie was filmed mostly in West Germany.  The Soviets allowed only brief filming in Gdansk, Poland because the book was banned in the Eastern Bloc.

2.  It was the first German film to win the Best Foreign Film Oscar.

3.  There is a controversial underage sex scene that caused an Oklahoma County District Judge to rule the movie contained child pornography.  Without search warrants or a court order, Oklahoma City police raided libraries and rental outlets to confiscate copies of the VHS.  They got addresses of customers and went to their houses to get the copies.  The District Attorney threatened to arrest anyone with a copy.  The ACLU got involved and federal courts ended the censorship. 

4.  The movie was also banned in parts of Canada.

5.  David Bennent had a condition that caused him to age slowly.  He was an 11 year old playing a 16 year old.  The sex scene was with Katharina Thalbach, who was 24 at the time.

Belle and Blade  =  N/A

Brassey’s              =  4.0

Video Hound       =  N/A

War Movies         =  N/A

Military History  =  #60

Channel 4             =  not on list

Film Site                =  yes

101 War Movies  =  no

OPINION:  I am glad to report that “The Tin Drum” is not a bad war movie because it is not a war movie. It is an odd tale set in a war.  I hate this movie.  I can’t even see how generic critics like it, much less war movie critics.   In my opinion, it belongs nowhere near this list.