A Time to Love and a Time to Die (1958)

Synopsis: During World War II, German soldier Ernst Graeber (John Gavin) leaves the ferocious fighting on the Russian front to return home on furlough but upon arrival finds his house decimated and his parents gone. He and a childhood acquaintance,... During World War II, German soldier Ernst Graeber (John Gavin) leaves the ferocious fighting on the Russian front to return home on furlough but upon arrival finds his house decimated and his parents gone. He and a childhood acquaintance, Elizabeth Kruse (Lilo Pulver), find one another amid the ruins of the town and fall in love, though Graeber knows he must eventually leave Elizabeth and return to combat. Director Douglas Sirk, drawn throughout his brilliant career to stories of desperate men and women ensnared in perilous affairs, found his most extreme scenario with A TIME TO LOVE AND A TIME TO DIE. The result of this perfect match between director and subject matter is astounding: a film in which each feverish frame shimmers with an almost supernatural intensity. While focusing unwaveringly on the doomed love of the couple at the center of his film, Sirk also explores the darkest corners of a world tearing itself apart. A particularly frightening element of Sirk's epic canvas is the men in Graeber's town allowing the war to transform them into nightmare versions of themselves. A TIME TO LOVE AND A TIME TO DIE was based on a novel by Erich Maria Remarque, who has a cameo role in the film. [More]

Starring: John Gavin, Lilo Pulver, Jock Mahoney, Keenan Wynn

Starring: John Gavin, Lilo Pulver, Jock Mahoney, Keenan Wynn, Erich Maria Remarque, Dieter Borsche, Barbara Rutting, Thayer David

Director: Douglas Sirk

Director: Douglas Sirk
Producer: Robert Arthur
Story: Erich Maria Remarque
Composer: Miklos Rozsa

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