"Somber Angst"
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What You Need To Know:
The acting and cinematography in this movie are well done, but it contains some strong language, violence and immoral sexual situations. It also includes an ineffectual Roman Catholic priest. Finally, the worldview of the movie is that this village and its social relationships are corrupt, and the only hope for these peasants is America. There is, however, no mention of the fact that America holds hope for the oppressed because of its biblically based Common Law system, which, while imperfect, still holds the promise that any citizen can truly reap what he or she sows. Thus, THE INHERITORS fails to understand that social and political issues are, at bottom, religious and moral issues
Content:
(Ro, B, Ab, LL, VV, SS, NN, AA, Ho, Fe, M) Romantic worldview that society corrupts people, with anti-feudal & moral & immoral elements; 14 obscenities & 6 profanities; implied murder, man punched, man beaten, & implied rape of woman; three scenes of depicted/implied sexual immorality plus implied rape & ribald elements; upper male nudity & implied nudity in sexual context; alcohol use & abuse; no smoking; one secretly homosexual character; one proto-feminist character; and, miscellaneous immorality such as local priest takes no action regarding social injustice.
More Detail:
THE INHERITORS is a somber Austrian movie about man’s inhumanity to man, particularly under an unjust criminal justice system. Although supposedly set in the 1930s, it feels like the middle ages, with the inviolable class system between peasants and land owners.
A lonely, bitter farmer is murdered, leaving his farm to ten laborers. While the peasants adjust to their new status, the town “farmers” or land owners set out to keep the lower classes in their place. A silent old woman named Rosalind, played by Elizabeth Orth, is found in the murdered man’s chicken coop. She does not try to hide her guilt as the murderess. As the story unfolds, the audience discovers her motive: Rosalind was the victim of a cruel rape and imprisonment by the murdered man years earlier.
The town’s farmers, led by a wicked man named Danninger, first try to buy the farm from the peasant inheritors for far less than it is worth. Then they assess a high price on it and have three of the inheritors demand unjust payment. The remaining seven of the peasants work overtime and sell everything they can to raise the money to buy the other three out. More injustice lurks just around the corner, because the village government only seems to serve Danninger or the other farmer’s bidding, so injustice piles upon injustice. An angst builds up that is never released, leading to a tragic end.
The acting in THE INHERITORS is wonderful, especially Sophie Rois as Emmy, the only peasant with strength to stand up to the wrongs being done. The cinematography bears echoes of Rembrandt, the Dutch master who painted with dark colors befitting the darkness of the times. Regrettably, THE INHERITORS contains some strong language, graphic violence and sexual situations, including a secretly homosexual character and an ineffectual religious leader in the form of a Roman Catholic priest.
The worldview of the movie is that this village and its social relationships are corrupt, and the only hope for these peasants is America (or their idealistic vision of that country). There is, however, no mention of the fact that America holds hope for the oppressed because of its biblically based Common Law system, which, while imperfect, still holds the promise that any citizen can truly reap what he or she sows. Thus, THE INHERITORS ultimately seems to be a little politically and historically naïve. It fails to understand that social and political issues are, at bottom, religious and moral issues.
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