Anita B. is tale of self-discovery in a post-Holocaust Europe. At the film's commencement, the eponymous protagonist travels to Czechoslovakia, where she is taken in by her aunt, Monika. In this new place, from amidst a medley of nationalities reconciling themselves with the enormous loss that the society has sustained, Anita grows close to Eli, her uncle's younger brother. Their budding relationship is convoluted and complex, just as the character of Eli is itself complex, and Anita's own attitude towards her burgeoning 'love' seems to fluctuate due to her uncertainty as to Eli's true intentions. Although this film is a story of how Anita comes to terms with her identity as a survivor, it is also a story of how she steps up to command her identity as an individual. She befriends David, a determined young man with an equally tragic past; Edith, her musically inclined neighbor who helps her navigate the path of love; and Sarah, who organizes the passage of Jewish refugees to Palestine.
The film begins with spanning panoramic shots of the wildernesses of Central Europe, and, as Anita makes her way into society and a more populated community, the sepia-toned color palate functions as a comment on how the lives of the characters have been washed of color in the aftermath of WWII. As the film progresses, we begin to see this sepia palate juxtaposed by isolated colors' vibrancies – when Anita takes a chance and begins to decorate the walls of her aunt's home with colorful depictions of the countryside, for example. This growing appearance of color is proportionate to the sporadic blooms of brightness that are gradually pulling the characters back into normalcy.
Aside from the aesthetically appealing cinematography, the relationship between Eli and Anita is the most interesting aspect of the film. Both Eli and Anita seem unsure of how to interact with the opposite gender – Eli defaults to crude force, and Anita, to submission – and their developing romantic relationship struggles to thrive under the pressure of convolution. We, as an audience, experience Anita's fluctuating mistrust and love and heartbreak as her interactions with Eli unfold, culminating in the accidental pregnancy. Eli straddles the roles of brother, father, and lover as he guides Anita through her journey to normality, and for this, Anita is understandably grateful. Her feelings of gratefulness develop into a misguided, child-like love as she gives into Eli's forceful advances. Even as Eli reveals himself to be outwardly violent and domineering, Anita desperately clings to the idea of love – something she has sorely been without amidst all of her terrible experiences. She does not realize that she herself has fallen out of affection for Eli until a kindly doctor reveals a courage and determinedness in her that she had thought lost.
While the film's plot is, at times, slow, it does an impressive job of capturing the texture and tide of life. We need those moments of leisure in order to appreciate the dramatic shift that has taken place between Anita's life at the concentration camps and her life in her aunt's household. It is because the film mimics the sporadic banality of life that we understand how she has become so comfortable in her new life, and how hard it must have been for her to summon the courage to abandon it for her journey to Palestine.
The film begins with spanning panoramic shots of the wildernesses of Central Europe, and, as Anita makes her way into society and a more populated community, the sepia-toned color palate functions as a comment on how the lives of the characters have been washed of color in the aftermath of WWII. As the film progresses, we begin to see this sepia palate juxtaposed by isolated colors' vibrancies – when Anita takes a chance and begins to decorate the walls of her aunt's home with colorful depictions of the countryside, for example. This growing appearance of color is proportionate to the sporadic blooms of brightness that are gradually pulling the characters back into normalcy.
Aside from the aesthetically appealing cinematography, the relationship between Eli and Anita is the most interesting aspect of the film. Both Eli and Anita seem unsure of how to interact with the opposite gender – Eli defaults to crude force, and Anita, to submission – and their developing romantic relationship struggles to thrive under the pressure of convolution. We, as an audience, experience Anita's fluctuating mistrust and love and heartbreak as her interactions with Eli unfold, culminating in the accidental pregnancy. Eli straddles the roles of brother, father, and lover as he guides Anita through her journey to normality, and for this, Anita is understandably grateful. Her feelings of gratefulness develop into a misguided, child-like love as she gives into Eli's forceful advances. Even as Eli reveals himself to be outwardly violent and domineering, Anita desperately clings to the idea of love – something she has sorely been without amidst all of her terrible experiences. She does not realize that she herself has fallen out of affection for Eli until a kindly doctor reveals a courage and determinedness in her that she had thought lost.
While the film's plot is, at times, slow, it does an impressive job of capturing the texture and tide of life. We need those moments of leisure in order to appreciate the dramatic shift that has taken place between Anita's life at the concentration camps and her life in her aunt's household. It is because the film mimics the sporadic banality of life that we understand how she has become so comfortable in her new life, and how hard it must have been for her to summon the courage to abandon it for her journey to Palestine.