Sunshine (1999)
The story of a Jewish family living in Hungary—through three generations—rising from humble beginnings to positions of wealth and power in the crumbling Austro-Hungarian Empire. The patriarch becomes a prominent judge but is torn when his government sanctions anti-Jewish persecutions. His son converts to Christianity to advance his career as a champion fencer and Olympic hero, but is caught up in the Holocaust. Finally, the grandson, after surviving war, revolution, loss and betrayal, realizes that his ultimate allegiance must be to himself and his heritage.
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This movie has haunted me all my life. It is beautifully shot - excellently edited. The acting is nuanced and very serious. Ralph is - clear, and involved, and real.It's a long, long film, reaching out and dragging you in, right inside, long past the amount of time we are used to sitting and listening and watching, well past our barriers of focus and concentration, well beyond our ability to intellectualize this or that... I found myself floating though history, through time - I found myself deeply moved and irrevocably different.This movie has haunted me all my life.
12 year old Emmanuel Sonnenschein left his village in the Austro-Hungarian Empire after his father died in a distillery explosion. Using his father's recipe, he creates a successful brew called "Taste of Sunshine" in Budapest. He has two sons Ignatz (Ralph Fiennes) and Gustave (James Frain). He also adopts his orphan niece Valerie (Jennifer Ehle). Ignatz becomes a prominent judge and marries Valerie. Gustave becomes a communist. The family struggles continue over the years as Ralph Fiennes plays different characters in each generation of Sonnenschein.This is a big ambitious movie. The idea of playing three generations within the same family may be compelling to Fiennes but they may be better off doing a trilogy. This could be also be a good TV series. There is simply too much material to contain in one sitting. Nevertheless Ralph Fiennes does a great job and the sweep of the whole experience is quite compelling.
"Sunshine" portrays three generations of the Hungarian-Jewish Sonnenschein family. Specifically, bad things happen to them with every major event (the attempted Communist takeover by Bela Kun, the Nazi invasion, the post-WWII Soviet takeover). Ralph Fiennes plays three generations of men. After watching this movie, you'll probably be very impressed about all of Hungary's various aspects; I certainly was. Every part of the movie is well-done. Fiennes plays all three roles perfectly, and Jennifer Ehle, Rosemary Harris, Rachel Weisz, John Neville, and the other cast members do quite well with their roles. Istvan Szabo directs with the same energy that he brought to "Mephisto" and "Being Julia". Perfect.
Schindler's List was apparently enough for most film goers. "Sunshine," superior to "Schindler" in many respects, got fewer accolades and much less attention. Why do I think "Sunshine" is superior to "Schindler?" Primarily because it tells the story of the Holocaust through the lens of a single family whose pre-Holocaust history gives a dimension and depth to the tragedy of that family that "Schlinder" is incapable of providing because of its quite different narrative strategy and focus. To be sure, "Schindler's" narrative sweep affords a greater sense than "Sunshine" of the scope of the slaughter. But "Sunshine" stands in relation to "Schindler" as a novel stands to a work of history. One brings the insights offered by individual tragedies, the other brings more of a societal perspective. The best "Holocaust" film, however, remains in this viewer's opinion, "The Pawnbroker" with Rod Stieger, which had an even narrower focus than "Sunshine" and brought the horror of the Holocaust to life by exploring the emotional desolation/death suffered by a single survivor. A truly great film.