Join Amazon Prime and get unlimited Free One-Day Delivery. Already a member? Sign in.

 

or
Sign in to turn on 1-Click ordering.
 
   
More Buying Choices
11 used & new from £5.93
Have one to sell? Sell yours here
 
   
Taking Sides [2003] [DVD]
 
See larger image 
Share your own customer images

Taking Sides [2003] [DVD]

DVD ~ Harvey Keitel
4.6 out of 5 stars See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
RRP: £15.99
Price: £5.98 & this item Delivered FREE in the UK with Super Saver Delivery. See details and conditions
You Save: £10.01 (63%)
In stock.
Dispatched from and sold by Amazon.co.uk. Gift-wrap available.

Want guaranteed delivery by Tuesday, July 7? Choose Express delivery at checkout. See Details
10 new from £5.93 1 used from £9.99
Learn about Lovefilm
Amazon's choice for DVD rental.
With a 14 day FREE trial. Learn more

Frequently Bought Together

Customers buy this item with Colonel Redl [1984] [DVD] DVD ~ Jan Niklas

Taking Sides [2003] [DVD] + Colonel Redl [1984] [DVD]
Price For Both: £15.65

Show availability and shipping details

What Do Customers Ultimately Buy After Viewing This Item?

Taking Sides [2003] [DVD]
89% buy the item featured on this page:
Taking Sides [2003] [DVD] 4.6 out of 5 stars (7)
£5.98
Sunshine [DVD] [2000]
4% buy
Sunshine [DVD] [2000] 4.6 out of 5 stars (13)
£3.98
Colonel Redl [1984] [DVD]
3% buy
Colonel Redl [1984] [DVD] 4.3 out of 5 stars (3)
£9.67
Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy : Complete BBC Series [1979] [DVD]
3% buy
Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy : Complete BBC Series [1979] [DVD] 5.0 out of 5 stars (52)
£5.98
Explore similar items

Product details

  • Actors: Harvey Keitel, Stellan Skarsgård, Moritz Bleibtreu, Birgit Minichmayr, Ulrich Tukur
  • Directors: István Szabó
  • Writers: Ronald Harwood
  • Producers: Adam Betteridge, Alex Marshall, David Rogers, Fritz Buttenstedt, Gisela Waetzoldt-Hildebrandt
  • Format: PAL
  • Language English, French, German, Russian
  • Region: All Regions
  • Number of discs: 2
  • Classification: 15
  • Studio: Guerilla Films
  • DVD Release Date: 5 Mar 2007
  • Run Time: 110 minutes
  • Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
  • ASIN: B0002K117O
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 7,123 in DVD (See Bestsellers in DVD)

    •  Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?

Reviews

Synopsis
Istvan Szabo (SUNSHINE) brings this intense and thought-provoking film to the screen with his signature vibrant photography, precise rendering of period details, and strong direction of powerful actors. Here, Harvey Keitel plays Major Steve Arnold, a gruff and rude American sent to Berlin just after World War II on a mission to root out men who were part of the Nazi party and charge them with their war crimes. He is assigned to investigate Wilhelm Furtwangler (Stellan Skarsgaard), the highly esteemed conductor of the Berlin Philharmonic. Hiring two young assistants, Lieutenant David Wills and Emmi Straube (Moritz Bleibtreu and Birgit Minichmayr), to research the conductor and his orchestra, Major Steve runs a tight ship. In fact, David and Emmi cringe at his lack of respect for the accomplished musicians they interview, and his total disregard for their art. Major Steve plays Beethoven on high volume on the office record player, usually to fuel his anger and charge up his finger-pointing interrogation tactics; while David and Emmi--who provide a sideline love story to the plot--simply appreciate the music and Furtwangler's skill in conducting it. TAKING SIDES depicts the jarring debate between Major Steve and Furtwangler as they discuss art and politics, the separation between the two, the confusion of war, and Furtwangler's potential culpability in having stayed in his homeland of Germany instead of leaving the country to protest the war.

Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought

The Lives Of Others [DVD] [2007]

The Lives Of Others [DVD] [2007]

DVD ~ Martina Gedeck
4.7 out of 5 stars (114)  £3.87
Colonel Redl [1984] [DVD]

Colonel Redl [1984] [DVD]

DVD ~ Jan Niklas
4.3 out of 5 stars (3)  £9.67
Insomnia [1998] [DVD]

Insomnia [1998] [DVD]

DVD ~ Stellan Skarsgård
4.0 out of 5 stars (8)  £6.98
The Dresser [DVD] [1984]

The Dresser [DVD] [1984]

DVD ~ Albert Finney
5.0 out of 5 stars (5)  £4.87
The Reader [DVD] [2008]

The Reader [DVD] [2008]

DVD ~ Kate Winslet
4.3 out of 5 stars (32)  £6.98
› Explore similar items

Tags Customers Associate with This Product

 (What's this?)
Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
Check the boxes next to the tags you consider relevant or enter your own tags in the field below
(2)
See all 2 tags...

Your tags: Add your first tag
 
See most popular tags
 

Customer Reviews

7 Reviews
5 star:
 (4)
4 star:
 (3)
3 star:    (0)
2 star:    (0)
1 star:    (0)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
4.6 out of 5 stars (7 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
Share your thoughts with other customers:
Most Helpful Customer Reviews

 
15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Pay your money and take your side, 25 Feb 2007
By Nicholas Casley (Plymouth, Devon, UK) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)      
I usually hesitate to purchase DVDs of films that I had not seen before, but in this case I was drawn by the scenario of the great German conductor Wilhelm Furtwangler being tested by the postwar American authorities as to the extent of his Nazi sympathies. I am glad that I made the purchase.

Based on Ronald Harwood's stage play (indeed he wrote the screenplay for the film), the film focusses on the reasons Furtwangler had for remaining in Germany to lead the Berlin Philharmonic when some of his fellow conductors and musicians left. In an interview that also comes with the DVD as well as in the accompanying commentary to the film, Harwood emphasises that he deliberately produced a finely balanced portrait and leaves the audience to 'take sides' based on the evidence produced.

The film can, of course, also be read in a modern context. What would you have done if you were in his shoes? Would you have stayed and fought from the inside, no matter how much they required some subservience to uncomfortable moral standpoints, or would you have bailed out but left those you loved and cared for (family and friends, Jews as well as former communists, homosexuals etc) to their fate? The film has some diversions, but the focus is largely on this argument.

The film is finely acted - not one 'duff' performance (apart, maybe from the Russian general and the ham-acted American general intorducing harvey Keitel to the job he had to do). The Hungarian director, Istvan Szabo, used some of the best in the business in his production team. Full credit to the editor and especially the cameraman - the colouring is spot on and some of the exterior shots very impressive. Impressive too are the interior scenes, finely crafted by Bond production designer, Ken Adam. Indeed, my two-DVD special edition includes a wonderful homage to Ken Adam, as he returns to his roots in East Berlin at the time of the fall of the Berlin Wall.

Overall, then, a very good film indeed. One that will test your moral bearings and stimulate your visual senses at the same time.
Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this)



 
11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars No Easy Answers, 24 Jul 2008
By F. S. L'hoir (Irvine, CA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)      
I found this film about the pre-trial interrogation of Wilhelm Furtwaengler, conductor of the Berlin Philharmonic during the Third Reich, both disturbing and compelling. My discomfort arose from the one-sided nature of the interrogation, since Major Arnold (Harvey Keitel) has been given the mandate of securing a conviction against Furtwaengler by any means including humiliation. The Major is both a zealot and a bully who makes no effort to see the dilemma of the great maestro--whom he dismisses as a "bandleader,"--who has chosen to remain in Germany and has been forced to walk a "tightrope" in order to co-exist with and survive an intolerable regime. The Major, a philistine who has no understanding of the conflict between art and politics, furthermore, does not even speak the same language, figuratively speaking, as the shattered Furtwaengler. His interrogation methods, in fact, are recognized by Emmi, his jobbed-in German Secretary, as being reminiscent of those of the Gestapo.

The acting is superb, especially on the part of Stellan Skarsgard, whose nuanced portrayal of Furtwaengler is tremendously moving. Although Keitel's performance begins on such a high note that it has no place to go, it is nevertheless appropriate given the circumstances of his task of getting a conviction at any cost. Under director Istvan Szabo's guidance, however, the temptation to "take sides" with Furtwaengler, because of the Major's bullying, is subtly subverted by questions of conscience and motivation on the part of the maestro.

The recreation of post-war Berlin is superb. Two outstanding scenes take place at concerts: the first, of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony, at a baroque church in the last days of the war, as allied bombers drop their payloads on Berlin; and the second, of the adagio of the Schubert string quintet, at the ruins of the same church, which has been bombed out. In the middle of the performance of the latter, the rain pours in and the black umbrellas go up, and no one thinks of leaving. The choice of music is emblematic: Beethoven with it's beat ( . . . -) [ V for Victory, for those too young to remember] accompanies the defeat of the Third Reich, while the sublime Schubert adagio offers consolation to the Berliners who are left to live with the consequences of that demented regime.

One of the aspects of this film that I liked the best is that it asks difficult questions of the viewer, but provides no answers--perhaps because there are none.
Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this)



 
10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Art and Authority Collide in this Excellent Film, 31 Aug 2006
By PhilsterNo1 (England) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)   
A most gripping story in which Furtwangler, the greatest conductor of the century and a man who lives only for music, is challenged by an American officer about his co-operation with the Nazis during Hitler's reign of intimidation and world war. Harvey Keitel is typically bullish as the self-righteous, uncompromising interrogator; Stellan Skarsgard superb as the lofty, philosophical and haunted German maestro. To the movie's credit, there is no clear bias although it is hard to sympathise with the American's bullying, simple-minded and eventually incoherent finger-pointing. The closing footage of the real Furtwangler is very revealing. Keitel fans and those interested in the scenario shouldn't hesitate.
Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this)


Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
 
 
 
Most Recent Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars Right or wrong?
Taken from a Ronald Harwood play we get a film with good dialogue. The acting too
is just as you'd imagine it with the vigorous Keitel as Major Arnold, dogmatic and... Read more
Published 20 days ago by technoguy

4.0 out of 5 stars Thought-provoking portrayal
There isn't a lot of dramatic entertainment here if you're not already interested in the topic, but if you are this is well worth seeing, featuring excellent performances from the... Read more
Published 20 days ago by K. McCann

5.0 out of 5 stars war criminal or simply a musical genius
This is the true story of Wilhelm Furtwangler, a brilliant musical conducter. Possible war criminal? Read more
Published 5 months ago by Red Rose

5.0 out of 5 stars Skarsgard's Furtwangler
At first I was somewhat dismayed that Stellan Skarsgard didn't look enough like existing photographs of the conductor, Wilhelm Furtwangler. I needn't have been concerned. Read more
Published 19 months ago by H. A. James

Only search this product's reviews


Customer Discussions

 Beta (What's this?)
This product's forum (0 discussions)
  Discussion Replies Latest Post
  No discussions yet

Ask questions, Share opinions, Gain insight
Start a new discussion
Topic:
First post:
Prompts for sign-in
  [Cancel]


Active discussions in related forums
   
Related forums

Listmania!

Create a Listmania! list

Look for similar items by category

Look for similar items by subject








i.e., each product must be in subject 1 AND subject 2 AND ...

Feedback

The Body Shop

The Body Shop - Vitamin C Skin Boost
Protect and boost your glow with The Body Shop Vitamin C Skin Boost.

›Shop The Body Shop

  

Up to 75% off Shoes

Shoe Clearance - 75% off Shoes
Save up to 75% on shoes for the whole family.

›Shop clearance shoes

  

Up to 53% off Braun Series Shavers

Braun Series 3 390cc Clean & Renew System Rechargeable Foil Electric Shaver
Get in touch with your smooth side with Braun Series shavers, now with Gillette blade technology.

›Discover Braun Series at Amazon.co.uk

  

Treat Someone

Amazon.co.uk Gift Certificates--available in any amount from £5 to £500 With an Amazon.co.uk Gift Certificate, you can get them what they want (even if you don't know what that is).

›Learn more about Gift Certificates

  
Ad

Where's My Stuff?

Delivery and Returns

Need Help?

Your Recent History

  (What's this?)
You have no recently viewed items or searches.

After viewing product detail pages or search results, look here to find an easy way to navigate back to pages you are interested in.

Look to the right column to find helpful suggestions for your shopping session.
Continue Shopping: Top Sellers

amazon.co.uk Amazon Home
International Sites:  United States  |  Germany  |  France  |  Japan  |  Canada  |  China
Business Programs: Sell on Amazon  |  Fulfilment by Amazon  |  Join Associates  |  Join Advantage
Customer Service  |  Help  |  View Basket  |  Your Account
About Amazon.co.uk  |  Careers at Amazon
Conditions of Use & Sale |  Privacy Notice  © 1996-2009, Amazon.com, Inc. and its affiliates