The Flat

Get Showtimes + Tickets

  • Opened October 19, 2012 (NY; 10/24 LA)
  • 1 hr 37 min
  • NR

  • At age 98, filmmaker Goldfinger's grandmother passed away, leaving him the task of clearing out the Tel Aviv flat that she and her husband shared for decades since immigrating from Nazi Germany in the 1930s. Sifting through a dense mountain of photos, letters, files, and objects, Goldfinger begins to uncover clues that seem to point to a greater mystery and soon a complicated family history unfolds before his camera. What starts to take shape reflects nothing less than the troubled and taboo story of three generations of Germans – both Jewish and non-Jewish – trying to piece together the puzzle of their lives in the aftermath of the terrible events of World War II.
    Note: In Hebrew, English and German with English subtitles. Full synopsis

  • Director: Arnon Goldfinger
  • Genres: Documentary

What's the Buzz?

Go
Fans say Go
365 fans
Read fan reviews
Must Go!
Critics say Must Go!
83 out of 100
Read critic reviews
Write your own review

Fan Reviews

No
A DOCUMENTARY ABOUT THE PILGRIMAGE OF AN ISRAELI MAN, STRUGGLING TO UNDERSTAND THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN HIS JEWISH GRANDPARENTS, AND A HIGH-RANKING NAZI OFFICIAL.

by Peneflix

A tiresome, true tale of an Israeli man, after the death of his 98?year-old grandmother, discovering correspondence, photographs and empirical evidence of a lifelong relationship between his Jewish...

Go
Relentless Search for the Truth about a Nazi

by pedsarq

The relatives of a holocaust survivor go through her apartment after she dies and find evidence that she and her husband were good friends with a German couple who were active Nazis before, during,...

Read more fan reviews

Critic Reviews

100
San Francisco Chronicle
|

The movie feels more like a thriller and a mystery than a documentary. Perhaps someday, someone will be inspired to dramatize this astonishing story. Read full review

91
Entertainment Weekly
| Lisa Schwarzbaum

I will salute the deftness and intelligence with which Goldfinger observes the reactions of the living to the revelations of the dead. Read full review

90
Wall Street Journal
| Joe Morgenstern

What makes The Flat mesmerizing is its wealth of historical detail. What makes it universal is what it says about families everywhere - that children, being children, don't want to know what their parents are up to, and that grown-ups, being human, don't want to credit troubling facts that conflict with what they need to believe. Read full review

88
Washington Post
| Michael O'Sullivan

A quietly brilliant study in cognitive dissonance, The Flat is a documentary look at Holocaust denial, but not the kind you might think. Read full review

Read more critic reviews

Offers

Photos

Gerda and Kurt Tuchler in "The Flat."