Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 7/10
Cast: Jean Reno, Anjelica Huston, Thomas Kretschmann, Noah Schnapp, Frederick Schmidt, Tomas Lemarquis, Sadie Frost, Gilles Marini, Nicholas Rowe, Josephine de La Baume, Elsa Zylberstein, Urs Rechn, William Abadie, Declan Cole, Jean-Francois Balmer, Michael Morpurgo, Raj Awasti, Lukas Sauer, Dolma Raisson, Enola Izquierdo Cicuendez, Kevin Kain, Mathys Gallet-Lartigue, Steffen Wild, Amandine Rose, Laurent Pedebernard.
It has been suggested, more than once, and certainly with a sneer, that certain generations spends too much time watching films that are centred around the subject of World War Two, the accusing, withered stare, damning the viewer to feeling a sense of shame, a kind of unwelcome reflection that dares to suggest that to keep reminding yourself of the atrocities inflicted upon a group of people is somehow appalling, wallowing in a misguided fantasy of a time when war was egotistical, where the viewer is the hero saving the day.
Only a fool wants to live through war, but to protect and save lives, no matter the creed, colour, inclination or orientation, war is a cost that knows no bounds, and in which whilst all are affected, we, as a species, must decide whether we fight for the right, or for the dishonourable, the detestable mindset and actions of others.
However, there is always a grey area in the middle to which people will fall into, given the right circumstance in which they question their decision, question the morality of right and wrong.
Based on the novel by Michael Morpurgo, the genius behind the sensational Warhorse story, Waiting For Anya is presented perhaps as a film for young adults, and is one that decries the sentiment bandied around that that despicable want of the Second World War is somehow no longer relevant; as long as there is intolerance, for as long as there is racism, fanaticism and xenophobia of any kind, then the dark lessons, those intolerable acts inflicted on a group of people by the evil that was the Third Reich and Nazism, then the lessons of compassion, open-mindedness, of love and honour to another human being, have not been learned.
The film itself is beautifully captured, the loneliness of the French village at the heart of the drama, the enclosed sense of foreboding, and the friendship struck between the young shepherd boy, Noah Shnapp and the conflicted German Korporal, played with great sensitivity by Thomas Kretschmann, cannot but install the fear felt by those villages in the Vichy controlled area of France, the want to do right to protect the young Jewish children who have been brought to them on the way to freedom in Spain, and the horror of what might become of themselves if they defy local Nazi leaders in not handing the children over.
Waiting For Anya might not be considered in the same class of film making as Warhorse, but it arguably shows a deeper understanding of the human condition, how young minds see the world created by their elders, and how one person can change a village’s destiny. Poignant, heart-breaking, life-affirming, Waiting For Anya is a film well worth discovering.
Ian D. Hall