Film Forum

U.K./West Germany/France, 1989
Directed by Jerry Schatzberg
Starring Jason Robards, Christien Anholt, Samuel West
Approx. 110 min.

“What kind of Jew are you?” “A German Jew! The kind who goes to synagogue on Yom Kippur and sings ‘Silent Night’ on Christmas!” 

Jason Robards stars as a New York Jewish lawyer who returns to his hometown of Stuttgart after 55 years to find traces of his parents (including a doctor father who was proud of having fought for the Fatherland during WWI) and closest school friend, scion of one of Germany’s most notable families. Told mostly in flashback, REUNION centers on the two 16-year-old boys (Christien Anholt as the young Robards and Samuel West as his aristocratic friend) and their unlikely friendship, even as national socialism begins to insinuate itself into everyday life.

Designed by the legendary Alexandre Trauner (whose credits include everything from Carné’s CHILDREN OF PARADISE to Wilder’s THE APARTMENT), who himself fled the anti-Semitic regime of his native Hungary, REUNION had a brief U.S. release in 1991 (“It opened on Friday and closed on Monday,” says Schatzberg) and then virtually disappeared for the next 35 years. Though its few original American reviews were positive, REUNION has had little critical traction in this country. It did much better, both critically and at the box office, in France, where it was nominated for the Cannes Film Festival’s Palme d’Or (Schatzberg had won one in 1973 for SCARECROW).

Presented with support from The Joan S. Constantiner Fund for Jewish and Holocaust Films, donated by Leon Constantiner and Family, and The Ada Katz Fund for Literature in Film

A RIALTO PICTURES RELEASE

Trailer

Reviews

“A new ‘old’ Schatzberg is cause for celebration.” 
– IndieWire (March 23, 2026)

“Schatzberg and Pinter made the perfect Holocaust movie for 2026...a masterful look at how civil society disintegrates.” 
– Tayla Zax, The Forward

“Much of what's impressive about its unfolding is the meticulous re-creation of Germany during the rise of Nazism (the superb production design is by the great Alexandre Trauner, who appears in a cameo in a warehouse office), as well as sensitive (and perhaps timely) depiction of how the gradual changes in national thinking were reflected in everyday life. It's a story that's been told before, but seldom with such feeling for detail and nuance. The performances are impeccable.”
 – Jonathan Rosenbaum

 “As a Holocaust film, REUNION is all the more effective because it’s about friendship first—about how we cannot always know the full measure of effect we have on the lives of others.”
 – Kevin Thomas, The Los Angeles Times

“Schatzberg’s visual fleetness marks a persuasive talent with actors and a sensitivity to deeply wounded characters... He has again found a theme and a script worthy of his peculiar talents: to restrain the emotions only to make their release more powerful.”
– Michel Ciment, Film Comment

“SCHATZBERG AT HIS BEST...”
– Time Out

“The two boys are ably played by Christien Anholt and Samuel West, and it is one of the film's minor triumphs that their adolescent enthusiasm and occasional priggishness raise a wry smile...There is a blistering moment when, faced by a boorish taxi driver, [Robards'] native tongue returns with vigor. This intelligent film, written by Harold Pinter with sensitivity and a sharp wit, is worth seeing for those few moments alone.”
– Hilary Mantel, The Spectator

“REUNION’s central drama, the forging and dissolution of an adolescent friendship in the last days of the Weimar Republic, takes on a guileless, prelapsarian lyricism, while the final, abrupt twist of the narrative resolves a lifetime of trauma and fixes its meaning permanently in place.”
– Screen Slate
Click here to read the full review