Jew-Boy Levi

Slight, clichéd and often overly theatrical, this account of the rise of anti-Semitism, as suffered by a cattledealer in love with an Aryan girl wooed by one of her own kind, in a Black Forest farming community in 1935 never offers insights of originality or interest. Every development is signposted, and the only surprise is that Eva Mattes, once a sexy Fassbinder siren, can now so convincingly play a lumpenly bovine hausfrau. (From a play by Thomas Strittmatter.