An Incredibly Moving Film Set in the Heart of the Warsaw Ghetto

Director Rodrigo Cortés has returned with an English-language feature film, Love Gets a Room. Cortés was previously known for his work on the Ryan Reynolds film Buried, as well other films like Red Lights and Down a Dark Hall. Having worked in his native language, Spanish, and English-language cinema, Cortés has repeatedly shown he is capable as a truly international filmmaker, and this newest movie adds to an already impressive filmography. He serves as a co-writer and editor as well in the production process.

This film is co-written with the German novelist and screenwriter David Safier, who has become best known for his work on the television series Berlin, Berlin. Love Gets a Room originally had its debut back in 2021 at the Seville European Film Festival, but is hitting theaters in North America in the summer of 2023; it was released in Spain beforehand. In Spain, the movie has been up for awards and has even won some.

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Love Gets a Room stars the Danish actress Clara Rugaard (most recently seen in season six of Black Mirror) and Irish actor and musician Ferdia Walsh-Peelo in the lead roles. Set in World War II, the heart of the film takes place in a theater inside the Warsaw ghetto. While many remarkable stories of resilience have come out about these topics, this movie’s focus is an acting group who are putting on a play for an audience, which serves as a form of escapism from the world outside, as the musical is a joyful one. But as external reality slowly leaks into the internal space, everything quickly becomes unavoidable for those involved with the production, and soon the audience as well.

Art Amid the Warsaw Ghetto

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Love Gets a Room opens with a sweeping shot that introduces the setting externally: the Warsaw Ghetto. The film takes place in the year 1942, one year before the Warsaw ghetto was dismantled and destroyed. In this context, there are only six months before the Jewish inhabitants of the ghetto are going to be deported to the Nazi concentration camps. Although that first scene goes through the intricacies of the world outside, this movie isn’t destined to be a glimpse at the historical situation on the street. What was once open becomes dark, claustrophobic, a seemingly different world.

The camera glides inside a local theater inside the ghetto, showing that a production is about to take place. Even with all the death and destruction happening in Poland’s Jewish communities, there are still places to celebrate hope and the arts, and this theater remains one of the few places where people can come for entertainment and a laugh. There are other problems and emotional baggage the acting troupe is carrying with them, though. Throughout Love Gets A Room, the play serves as a conduit for the emotions and thoughts the characters are carrying with them in their personal lives.

The story is told through the lens of a few young actors inside the troupe who have to make critical decisions by the play’s end. Some include the possibility of escaping abroad before the situation in Warsaw gets worse, others include what to do when it comes to resisting against the Nazis. For some, even putting on a musical like this is an act of resistance, but for others, they want to take it a step further and incorporate resistance actively with their political and personal agendas. Each character brings something different to the table, but many of their acts stem from devotion and love for each other, whether romantic or platonic.

Although this seems like a place to escape reality for a little while, the political situation slowly begins to permeate inside the theater. First, it comes through the actors and their issues, molding into their performances each time they step on and off of the stage, but it’s only a matter of time before the entrance doors open in front of them, and in comes a Nazi officer in search of someone specific. It’s in this climax that the bubble they’ve insulated themselves inside bursts, and what could be denied before suddenly is thrown back at their faces.

A Theatrical, Emotional Mirror

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One of the most fascinating parts about Love Gets a Room is that it is a production inside a production. When casting actors for the movie, they were specifically looking for actors who could perform and sing in a musical setting. All the scenes shown throughout the movie that takes place on the stage are performed by the actors – it’s a legitimate theatrical piece inside a movie. In MovieWeb’s interview with the director, it has been revealed that the lyrics for the musical the characters were singing are also an authentic piece from the era–while the lyrics were able to survive the Holocaust and the war, the original music was lost.

The film concocts an original plot to have the musical serve as a mirror for what’s happening to those living inside the ghetto. Some of the world’s greatest art and literature have emerged amid awful historical occurrences happening in real-time for the author, artist, or creative, and what ends up happening is an ethnography of sorts. Love Gets a Room brings to life a piece of art that could have easily been lost in the throes of war and tragedy, and uses it as a mirror to demonstrate the conditions faced by the characters.

What ends up being created from this is an extended conversation between the film, the viewer, and the theatrical work being brought to the fictional stage of this movie’s world. In the contemporary world, art, writing, and filmmaking may be all about profit margins and what awards each movie might win, but it’s films like these that remind us of why we even make art in the first place. In times of great hardship, many have turned to these mediums to express themselves in ways that can also double as self-preservation. For others, it’s a form of escapism from the long day and what’s ahead of us.

There are many ways that Cortés could have failed in weaving in the elements of two different mediums, but he triumphantly succeeds in bringing them together productively. He shows that he has engaged with the source material thoughtfully, with care and a gentle tenderness that is quite cinematic. It’s not simply theater caught on camera. Love Gets a Room elevates it to another level, one that would be hard to beat for other filmmakers looking to emulate such a style.

A Necessary Film to Watch

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Love Gets a Room is a small snapshot of a very specific moment in history, told with theatrics throughout the night. Little is needed to be known about these characters to progress through the plot; the basics are introduced through conversations and asides when they’re off-stage, introducing their problems and backstories in a variety of ways. For a movie like this, it is a unique addition to the storytelling behind what was happening in the Warsaw ghetto; many may know the facts and names of such events, but not the vibrant arts communities that were being kept alive even when others tried to smother them.

The filmmaking in Love Gets a Room is superb, a mark of brilliance from Cortés. From that beginning scene where the world seems open, despite being contained within the Warsaw ghetto, moving inside the theater paradoxically opens the film up for new avenues. It feels dark, claustrophobic, and crammed with people and things that need to be done. It’s a different side of the situation that’s occurring on the streets, and although it feels safe from the outside world for a little while, it still reeks of danger when the time comes. The movie’s actors must play two completely different roles while on stage and in front of the camera, making this even more of a commendable effort.

However, it may not be a movie that’s for everyone. Love Gets a Room isn’t a musical, nor does it pretend to be. The characters in the film are simply putting on a show for other people and happen to sing. It’s a film that needs to be rewatched repeatedly, savored with each viewing for the plot, acting, and technical elements altogether. Some movies make for good entertainment and not much else, but Love Gets a Room is a piece of pure, excellent storytelling at its core. It’s an ode to cinema, history, and a tragic piece of world history. Although it may not be the easiest movie to watch, it’s a necessary one for all lovers of cinema as an art form.

From buffalo 8, Love Gets a Room is out in theaters on June 23, 2023 and available on demand beginning June 30.

You can view the original article HERE.