Locarno in Beirut: Germany Year Zero

The Sursock Museum, in partnership with the Embassy of Switzerland in Lebanon, Metropolis Cinema, and UBS AG have the pleasure to present Locarno in Beirut: Celebrating 70 Years of Locarno Festival, taking place between Wednesday 23 May and Monday 28 May. Three outdoor screenings will be held at the Sursock Museum, followed by three screenings at Metropolis Empire Sofil Cinema, in Ashrafieh.

Germany Year Zero (Germania Anno Zero)
Dir. Roberto Rossellini, 1948
HD, 75'
In German, English and French with English subtitles

Cast: Edmund Moeschke, Ernst Pittschau, Ingetraud Hinze
Director of Photography: Robert Juillard
Music: Renzo Rossellini
Grand Prix and Best Original Screenplay - Locarno International Film Festival 1948

Edmund, a young boy who lives in the destroyed Germany after the World War II, has to do all kinds of work and tricks to help his family get food and survive. One day, he meets one of his old school teachers, and hopes to get support from him, but this man's ideas do not lead Edmund towards a clearer or safer way of living.

Roberto Rossellini is one of the most widely known post-World War II motion-picture directors of Italy. Only two years after his last fascist feature, Rossellini completed Roma, città aperta (1945), one of the most important - and immediate - antifascist films, considered by many the beginning of Italian neo-Realism. This direction was emphasized in his following Paisà (1946), but Germania, anno zero (1947), the last of the trilogy, announced an important change. Filmed with local non-professional actors and taking place in Berlin, this film illustrates his ideas about realism, which "is nothing other than the artistic form of truth." Rossellini's realistic style strongly influenced the development of important cinema talents, such as the director Federico Fellini.