User Reviews

It is supposed to be a true story that happened to a young man later remembered or rather recollected by the same man grown quite older, some forty years later. It happens around 1933 in Berlin centering on Hitler's arrival to power.

The young English, aristocratic man from England, Christopher Isherwood, goes to Berlin to meet with the young men available there most of the time for a price. He will let himself roll and rock in this atmosphere though he will be very hostile to the exchange of money that he will always refuse in his mind. That will lead him to confronting one of his regular lovers and that lover will plainly disappear after that confrontation, only to be met against in the brown uniform of the SA though identified as a SS uniform.

He does not understand that in the crisis in Germany in 1933 many young men who had no work chose to make the surviving money they needed by renting their bodies for a short moment to other men, generally older men, for a small amount of money, since they could not rent their bodies to an employer who would make a profit out of it by investing their work in the production of goods. Morally, socially and even physically there is no difference. Christopher does not understand there is no love in that exchange. Nothing but a commercial action of sheer survival.

And the only choice they have if they do not want to go on or to start that "professional" activity is to join the SS, the SA, the Nazi Party and make a living by crushing the lives of others, Jews, merchants, gays, or whatever – mind you not whoever – is in the way of their getting rid of as many millions of people possible to make the misery and poverty of the others just one iota better.

He will though find the love he is looking for. But he will not be able to keep him in Great Britain after the arrival of Hitler because a British civil servant will understand the sexual dimension of the attachment and refuse the visa. That will end badly for that young German, Heinz, in the hands of the Gestapo, with one year of forced labor and two years in the army.

That could have been a good though sad end, but the author morbidly goes one step further in his self-accusation. He goes back to Berlin in 1952 and meets the people who have survived Hitler. His landlady, for one, who makes him a present. And of course Heinz who lives in East Berlin though the Wall has not been built yet. Without giving the details of that end, it reveals how deep the uncaring carelessness of Christopher in 1933 has become a selfish nostalgia that turns the uncaring carelessness into a blunt rejection.

The film is well done, shows the atmosphere in Germany in 1933, though rather superficially, but it reveals the extreme egotism of that man who only considered Berlin as a hunting ground and revisits it when the raptor, vulture and predator he has been has found his balance in the evanescent scintillating world of Hollywood.

A sad, very sad vision of these aristocrats who can do what they want, provided they satisfy their desires in a lower social strata than theirs. Oscar Wilde (shown burning in Berlin) did the reverse and could not be accepted: he, a plebeian Irishman, who captured the passion of a young English Lord. Social, aristocratic divide breaking, ethnic and national rebellious crime against at the time Her Majesty's supreme aristocracy. To prison and then banned from proper English society, though the young Lord pays no price, of course not.

We have in this film the reverse situation and it reveals the extreme self-centered blindness of the author at the time of events.

Dr Jacques COULARDEAU

A true story told well. Like the movie "The Pianist", you really get a feeling of how it was to be there. Berlin, and Munich and some other German cites were quite tolerant of Gays throughout the '20's and Germany had the highest levels of education in the world at the time. From this distance it's hard to imagine how the rise of the Nazis could have happened, and movies like this make it real to today's viewers. Of course opposition to Hitler in the 1930's was not as solid here and in England as is portrayed by most of today's history books. Nor is it safe to assume that something similar could not happen again, although likely in a different form than seen among modern NeoNazis. Something that seems so right to most people at the time. It has been said that insanity is rare in individuals but quite common in groups.

In the summer of 2010 I found myself on a transatlantic flight with a book, "Christopher and His Kind" and, coincidentally, a list of inflight movies that included, "Cabaret". I had never seen the film nor heard of the book. I still don't recall how I ended up with it on that flight. I do recall turning to my husband halfway through the book and saying these words, "Holy crap. I wish I knew how to write a screenplay. This book would make an amazing film." It still would.

Of all the failings of this film, and the downfall of every bad film, it is the weak screenplay that doomed it. It is trivial. And the source material, the novel, is anything but trivial. The screenplay is a grocery list of the parade of horribles that led to WWII. We already know them and half of the measly 87 minutes of this film did not need to be taken up by laying them out for the billionth time; and in the most hackneyed ways. You've got the Chrystal Nacht, the Swaztika banners, the good boy turned brownshirt, even the camera shot framing the main character through the Star of David painted onto a Jewish shop window. No imagination anywhere. And that brings us to the second worst failing of this film, it's star, Matt Smith. His Christopher Isherwood is little more than a potted plant with either a winsome or surprised look on his face that alternates A, B, A, B, throughout. No one who writes as well, or lived as interesting a life, as Christopher Isherwood could ever be so dull. The actual facts of Isherwood's life during this period is riveting. This screenplay, and it's lead actor, aren't.

I would not recommend this film to anyone but it would be unfair not to mention here that there were several excellent performances in the supporting cast. Imogen Poots (what a name...) as Jean Ross was everything that Sally Bowles was, and Liza Minnell (according to Isherwood himself) wasn't: half talented and full of unearned confidence. Lindsay Duncan as Isherwood's mother was cold comfort, which is to say, no comfort. Her damp love did nothing for her sons both of whom fled from her when they were able. Pipp Carter with very little screen time as Wysten Auden, made a strong impression as Isherwood's best friend; and depressed, religiously tortured, brooding, confidant. But it was an interesting and bizarre performance by Perry Milward, as Christopher's younger brother, that stood out most. The character, Richard Isherwood, is odd. And as a viewer you're not quite sure why. He knows he on the outside looking in, and that is possibly the source of his gentle humanity, even if he is slightly "off". Milward gives a quirky, and interesting, performance that does more to define the dysfunctional family dynamics than his lines ever intended.

Unfortunately, for this film, a few good performances in the supporting cast can't save it from a shallow understanding of the story by the screenwriter and a listless performance by the title character. Where would "Cabaret" be if Liza Minnelli were bad. Nowhere. If you are interested in this story read the book and watch "Cabaret". My only regret is that I didn't discover either of them until forty years after they came into existence. They are as relevant today as they were when they were made. This film won't be around four minutes from now.

I don't know why people dislike Matt Smith so much. I thought he was a very creditable Christopher Isherwood. And Imogen Poots is a far more rounded-out 'Sally Bowles' aka Jean Ross, than Liza Minelli was in Cabaret. Though that was a very different genre altogether and Minelli was OK as far as it went.

Christopher and His Kind is a well-produced and acted BBC period piece that evokes Berlin of the 1930s vividly. The characterizations are appealing and often quite funny and the men are beautiful, with a far amount of nudity thrown in for diversion, but nothing vulgar or prurient.

Much of the story is quite moving, the plight of the impoverished Berliners is heart-rending but not depressing. This is not a depressing tale but a cautionary one. The Nazis are well in evidence but not obnoxiously thrust into the viewers' faces as is so often the case. By now we know about the atrocities and it's good to be reminded, especially in a more subtle manner than usual.

This is a fine BBC show and I recommend it strongly.

I have just watched this film and upon reading the reviews became quite confused since most of the reviews are being considerably harsh, particularly when it comes to Matt Smith's performance. Perhaps it is because I am extremely fond of the actor, but I found his performance compelling and warm, though a bit awkward. I enjoyed the film thoroughly. The atmosphere of Berlin in 1933 was captured really well and the supporting actors were well cast. Imogen Poots' Jean was wonderfully outrageous. The greatest fault I found with the movie is probably that Heinz in the last bit in 1952 looks more like a woman impersonating a man than an aged man.

Overall definitely a film I would recommend.

Plot: An English homosexual goes to Berlin in the 1930s as the Weimar Republic ends and National Socialism begins.

This is rather typical of BBC serious drama in that it has high production values, a youthful lead parachuted in because of his celebrity and a very dull script. Christopher Isherwood was a rather interesting gay novelist and the period when he lived in Germany was even more interesting as it covers the depravity of Weimar and the novel horrors of the National Socialists - but sadly the screenplay isn't very interested in all that and plumps for plenty of gay sex and clichéd Nazis instead. You'll have to read the relevant chapter in Michael Burleigh's book 'Sacred Causes' if you want insight. The acting is pretty pedestrian, with the grey-haired veterans putting the fresh faced sexy-but-dim types to shame. Nor does it help that the whole thing is shot in the same dull, flat manner, so that everything looks and feels rather same-y and boring.

Worth no viewings.

From the hyperbolic verbiage of Oscar to the sparser prose of Mr Isherwood took only only two generations of Gay literature but during that relatively short time the love that dare not speak its name was being being grasped (figuratively speaking) by the incipient chattering classes and buggery - if "Christopher and his kind" is to be believed - was being elevated to the level of an Olympic Sport. Certainly Mr Isherwood,once having escaped from England's frying - pan to Nazi Germany's fire ( and you must ask what was he thinking about here)joyfully entered the fray,gleefully indulging in rough trade with all the energy of his class(posh domineering widowed mum,unwilling Cambridge student dropout). This programme was so bad it made me look back with affection towards the Laurence Harvey "I am a camera" of half a century ago - and anyone who remembers that will know what a leap in the dark I'm making. Mr M.Smith is very poor as Isherwood,inciting no sympathy whatsoever,rather a drawback you might think in a drama where he is the main character and,presumably,is supposed to be presenting a gay man in a positive way.Sadly Mr Smith does not seem to possess the acting "chops" to carry off such a complex part. His Isherwood is only interested in one thing - and we all know what that is. "Christopher and his kind" is a missed opportunity to interest a new generation to a minor but interesting figure of British literature whose life surely cannot really have been so proscribed by his sexuality.