I don't know if it's just the age of the film, but the quality of the dvd I was terrible. The costumes throughout are good, but the direction is also pretty bad. The narrator is awful. The rest of the actors are really pretty dreadful, except Peggy Ashcroft. The script is dull at times, and rushed at others. It often feels like there is no point to it. The baddies are very bad and cliched, and none of the characters have much motivation to do what they do. (although I definitely disagree with another reviewer that this is a pro-Christian film since the Christians are quite nasty.. but I digress.) So overall, this film is really not well made, but it was the beginning of the sound era, so many of the problems come from this.
There is one amazing reason to see this absolutely dreadful film, however. One shining gem in all the dullness. That is the performances of Conrad Veidt. He has many surprising and charming "bits" in this film, (like when he looks at the invisible audience and asks them to keep quiet) and even though he is playing the same man, he seems to be different throughout the ages. Because everything else is so bad, he shines all the more, past the bad sound quality and past the bad film quality. In the last scene he was so fantastic, fantastic, fantastic, I forgot that I was watching this bad quality film and wept for him.
So if you have patience and are a fan of really stellar acting, watch it. Conrad Veidt gives the film a ten.
Review of The Wandering Jew
