Summer of My German Soldier (1978) (TV)

User Rating:

7.6/10   

Director:

Michael Tuchner

Writers:

Bette Greene (novel)
Jane-Howard Hammerstein (writer)

Release Date:

30 October 1978 (USA)

Genre:

Drama | Romance

Plot:

A young American girl meets a German prisoner of war.

Plot Keywords:

Prisoner Of War | Wartime Romance | WWII | Based On Novel

Awards:

Won Primetime Emmy. Another 1 win & 2 nominations

Cast

Kristy McNichol	...	Patty Bergen
Bruce Davison	...	Anton Reiker
Esther Rolle	...	Ruth
Michael Constantine	...	Harry Bergen
Barbara Barrie	...	Mrs. Bergen
James Noble	...	Pierce
Robyn Lively	...	Sharon Bergen
Margaret Hall	...	Sister Parker
Anne Haney	...	Mrs. Benn
Sonny Shroyer	...	McFee
Jane Hickey	...	Edna Louise
Mary Nell Santacroce	...	Gussie Mae
Roy Morris	...	Freddy
William Ovell	...	Mayor Holderness
J. Don Ferguson	...	Mr. Jackson

Runtime:

100 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.33 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

Iceland:L

Filming Locations:

Crawfordville, Georgia, USA

Company:

Highgate Pictures

Trivia:

Anne Haney's first TV performance.

Quotes:

Sharon Bergen: [Sharon's birthday poem for her father] There once was a wonderful daddy, a daddy for me and for Patty. He was married to mommy, who put food in his tummy, but it didn't make him very fatty.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in "Mystery Science Theater 3000: Bloodlust! (#7.7)" (1994)

Stale

I would catch this cornball melodrama years ago and its ridiculous attempts at confronting discrimination and racism and showing love can conquer better than war or hate is as preachy and as alienating as the most disapproving image of Mother Superior or any other kind of Catholic priest or charismatic evangelist.

Other posts have relayed what the story was about. I can honestly say I didn't catch on to it being a wonderful love story, that's for sure.

McNichol and Davison were hardly a sweet teen romance. I recall Constantine's quiet "youre dead to me" comment to McNichol, but McNichol would also scream at all those around they were murderers when the escaped German prisoner was shot and killed.

Talk about cheesy angst, over and over again with this thing.

But I guess the funniest moment for me was at the very end with Anne Haney, the elderly lady perhaps best known for her final appearances in "Mrs. Doubtfire" when Robin Williams shoved his face in that cake, and she was in "Liar, Liar" with Jim Carrey as his assistant.

Haney is a gossipy neighbor lady, representing society at large in this one woman.

As McNichol and her only ally, it seems, Esther Rolle (who won a supporting actress Emmy for this thing) are walking down the streets, enduring all the glaring stares of disapproval.

Haney spews out the most incredible slur I think I have ever heard, "Jew Nazi n*gg*r lover."

I was totally confused how one could be a Jew lover and a Nazi lover as one was killing the other in WWII, when this movie was taking place. Where on Earth did the Jew figure into it?

Rolle would then deliver a tirade on Haney "leave this child be!" which of course would be highly unlikely for a Black woman to talk to a white woman like that in the forties, as anyone who checks out Oprah Winfrey's imprisonment in "Color Purple" will see.

This movie was alot of wishful thinking; that people could speak so freely and that others would be silenced so easily. Unfortunately all it does is more dividing of the masses, leaving society as a whole back at square one, if we are to believe the messages here.