The Shop on Main Street

Release date: 1965-06-24
Votes: 214
Genres: Drama, War
In a small town in Nazi-occupied Slovakia during World War II, decent but timid carpenter Tono is named "Aryan comptroller" of a button store owned by an old Jewish widow, Rozalie. Since the post comes with a salary and standing in the town's corrupt hierarchy, Tono wrestles with greed and guilt as he and Rozalie gradually befriend each other. When the authorities order all Jews in town to be rounded up, Tono faces a moral dilemma unlike any he's known before.
Reviews

griggs79
Catastrophe sprouts from tiny choices in Slovak New Wave gem _The Shop on Main Street_. In 1942 a mild carpenter becomes “Aryan controller” of a Jewish widow’s button shop. He tries to stay decent; the regime leans harder. Ida Kaminska lends the widow wary warmth, every twitch caught by the lens. Directors Kadár and Klos favour steady shots, dry wit and the odd dream flicker. No gore, only rising moral torque, ending with a thud that keeps echoing.
Movie Recommendation
- Main Tera Hero2014-04-04Seenu loves Sunaina but they're chased by a stalking cop, an infatuated beauty and her mafia don dad - can Seenu's heroics work?More...
- Main Street1956-10-26A small town in Spain, October 1955. Isabel, a 35-year-old dreamer who feels like a failure because she is not married yet, becomes the new target of a group of soulless pranksters.More...
- Maine-Ocean Express1986-04-16"Maine-Ocean" is the name of a train that rides from Paris to Saint-Nazaire (near the ocean). In that train, Dejanira, a Brazilian, has a brush with the two ticket inspectors. Mimi, another traveler and also a lawyer, helps her. The four of them will meet together later and live a few shifted adventures with a strange-speaking sailor (Mimi's client).More...
- Main Krishna Hoon2013-01-25In answer to an orphan boy's prayers, the divine Lord Krishna comes to Earth, befriends the boy, and helps him find a loving family.More...
- Maine Pyaar Kyun Kiya?2005-07-15Dr Samir is an absolute charmer when it comes to women, but he poses as a married man to keep them at bay. Love becomes a three-ring-circus for him after he ends up tangled in his web of lies with his girlfriend Sonia and pretend wife Naina.More...
- Main Atal Hoon2024-01-19Statesman and poet Shri Atal Bihari Vajpayee's eloquence and vision shaped India's destiny. A look at his remarkable life as he led his country through a challenging period of change and development as the 10th Prime Minister of India.More...
- Ni Main Sass Kuttni 22024-06-07A vengeful mother-in-law locks horns with her daughter-in-law in a twisted tale laced with dark comedy, political intrigue, and chilling thrills.More...
- Divers at Work on the Wreck of the "Maine"1898-01-01Divers go to work on a wrecked ship (the battleship Maine that was blown up in Havana harbour during the Spanish-American War), surrounded by curiously disproportionate fish.More...
- East of Main Street: Milestones2013-05-01The Venice Hongwanji Buddhist Temple had an opportunity to take part in an episode of East of Main Street, an HBO documentary series that has been produced for the past three years to celebrate Asian Pacific American Heritage Month. This year’s episode, Milestones, focuses on how different groups of Asian Americans mark the milestones throughout their lives.More...
- Midnight Movies: From the Margin to the Mainstream2006-06-20From 1970-1977, six low budget films shown at midnight transformed the way we make and watch films.More...
- State and Main2000-08-26A movie crew invades a small town whose residents are all too ready to give up their values for showbiz glitz.More...
- Sweekar Kiya Maine1983-09-30Gopika Sharma lives a middle-classed lifestyle along with her widowed mother in Bangalore. She expresses a desire to sing and is encouraged by her maternal uncle, Dubey, who takes her with him to Bombay along with her maid, Lajjo. Once there, they are molested and Dubey goes missing. They then attempt to find a decent place to live, and after many frustrations make an agreement with a single male, Kishankumar Shukla, who poses as Gopika's husband, and move into an apartment owned by Lala Dhaniram.More...
- Walk on the Wild Side1962-02-21At a 1930s New Orleans bordello, Hallie is the main attraction for both clients and the shrewd madam. The arrival of Dove Linkhorn, her lovesick sweetheart from three years ago, disrupts the normal and triggers a chain of events involving a number of people, including the young woman he travelled with, who is now the Doll House's newest employee.More...
- Closely Watched Trains1966-11-18At a village railway station in occupied Czechoslovakia, a bumbling dispatcher’s apprentice longs to liberate himself from his virginity. Oblivious to the war and the resistance that surrounds him, this young man embarks on a journey of sexual awakening and self-discovery, encountering a universe of frustration, eroticism, and adventure within his sleepy backwater depot.More...
- The Discord1978-03-16Guillaume has made it: A machine that can clean dirty air by simply sucking all dirt into air balloons and then shipping them far far away so his explanation. Some Japanese business guys, after dinner with a lot of alcohol, order 5,000 pieces. His only problem: His production capacity is way to small so he gets to produce the machines in his private house. His wife Bernadette is far from being happy about it. Her private life goes down the line so she decides to leave Guillaume and to finally have revenge she candidates for major against her husband...More...
- Disney Presents: Main Street Electrical Parade - Farewell Season1996-11-25Catch the spark after dark at Disneyland Park. And say farewell to one of the Magic Kingdom's most celebrated traditions - The Main Street Electrical Parade. Where else, but in The Main Street Electrical Parade, could you see an illuminated 40-foot-long fire-breathing dragon? And hear the energy of its legendary melody one last time? It's unforgettable after-dark magic that will glow in your heart long after the last float has disappeared.More...
- Tu Jhoothi Main Makkaar2023-03-08To earn extra cash, Mickey helps couples break up — but life gets complicated when he falls for Tinni, a career woman with an independent streak.More...
- The Kid with a Bike2011-05-18Abandoned by his father, a young boy is left in the hands of an unqualified childcare provider.More...
- Liberation: Direction of the Main Blow1970-10-21This five part epic war drama gives a dramatized detailed account of Soviet Union's war against Nazi Germany during world war two. Each of the five parts represents a separate major eastern front campaign.More...
- Mainstream2021-05-07A young woman thinks she’s found a path to internet stardom when she starts making YouTube videos with a charismatic stranger – until the dark side of viral celebrity threatens to ruin them both.More...
Similar Movies
The Pianist
2002-09-17The true story of pianist Władysław Szpilman's experiences in Warsaw during the Nazi occupation. When the Jews of the city find themselves forced into a ghetto, Szpilman finds work playing in a café; and when his family is deported in 1942, he stays behind, works for a while as a laborer, and eventually goes into hiding in the ruins of the war-torn city.Schindler's List
1993-12-15The true story of how businessman Oskar Schindler saved over a thousand Jewish lives from the Nazis while they worked as slaves in his factory during World War II.Jean Moulin, une affa...
2003-01-06Drama set in the Second World War, focused on Jean Moulin, hero, martyr and symbol of the French resistance and the patriotism during the dark years of Nazi occupation.Downfall
2004-09-16In April of 1945, Germany stands at the brink of defeat with the Russian Army closing in from the east and the Allied Expeditionary Force attacking from the west. In Berlin, capital of the Third Reich, Adolf Hitler proclaims that Germany will still achieve victory and orders his generals and advisers to fight to the last man. When the end finally does come, and Hitler lies dead by his own hand, what is left of his military must find a way to end the killing that is the Battle of Berlin, and lay down their arms in surrender.Life Is Beautiful
1997-12-20A touching story of an Italian book seller of Jewish ancestry who lives in his own little fairy tale. His creative and happy life would come to an abrupt halt when his entire family is deported to a concentration camp during World War II. While locked up he tries to convince his son that the whole thing is just a game.The Tin Drum
1979-05-02Oskar Matzerath is a very unusual boy. Refusing to leave the womb until promised a tin drum by his mother, Agnes, Oskar is reluctant to enter a world he sees as filled with hypocrisy and injustice, and vows on his third birthday to never grow up. Miraculously, he gets his wish. As the Nazis rise to power in Danzig, Oskar wills himself to remain a child, beating his tin drum incessantly and screaming in protest at the chaos surrounding him.The Good German
2006-12-15An American journalist arrives in Berlin just after the end of World War Two. He becomes involved in a murder mystery surrounding a dead GI who washes up at a lakeside mansion during the Potsdam negotiations between the Allied powers. Soon his investigation connects with his search for his married pre-war German lover.To Be or Not to Be
1942-03-06During the Nazi occupation of Poland, an acting troupe becomes embroiled in a Polish soldier's efforts to track down a German spy.Casablanca
1943-01-15In Casablanca, Morocco in December 1941, a cynical American expatriate meets a former lover, with unforeseen complications.Rome, Open City
1945-10-08In WWII-era Rome, underground resistance leader Manfredi attempts to evade the Gestapo by enlisting the help of Pina, the fiancée of a fellow member of the resistance, and Don Pietro, the priest due to oversee her marriage. But it’s not long before the Nazis and the local police find him.Everything Is Illumin...
2005-09-05A young Jewish American man endeavors—with the help of eccentric, distant relatives—to find the woman who saved his grandfather during World War II—in a Ukrainian village which was ultimately razed by the Nazis.Inside Man
2006-03-17When an armed, masked gang enter a Manhattan bank, lock the doors and take hostages, the detective assigned to effect their release enters negotiations preoccupied with corruption charges he is facing.The Bridge
1959-10-21A group of German boys are ordered to protect a small bridge in their home village during the waning months of the second world war. Truckloads of defeated, cynical Wehrmacht soldiers flee the approaching American troops, but the boys, full of enthusiasm for the "blood and honor" Nazi ideology, stay to defend the useless bridge. The film is based on a West German anti-war novel of the same name, written by Gregor Dorfmeister.Freedom Writers
2007-01-05A young teacher inspires her class of at-risk students to learn tolerance, apply themselves, and pursue education beyond high school.The Dirty Dozen
1967-06-1512 American military prisoners in World War II are ordered to infiltrate a well-guarded enemy château and kill the Nazi officers vacationing there. The soldiers, most of whom are facing death sentences for a variety of violent crimes, agree to the mission and the possible commuting of their sentences.2 or 3 Things I Know ...
2005-04-07What would your family reminiscences about dad sound like if he had been an early supporter of Hitler’s, a leader of the notorious SA and the Third Reich’s minister in charge of Slovakia, including its Final Solution? Executed as a war criminal in 1947, Hanns Ludin left behind a grieving widow and six young children, the youngest of whom became a filmmaker. It's a fascinating, maddening, sometimes even humorous look at what the director calls "a typical German story." (Film Forum)The Remains of the Da...
1993-11-05A rule-bound head butler's world of manners and decorum in the household he maintains is tested by the arrival of a housekeeper who falls in love with him in post-WWI Britain. The possibility of romance and his master's cultivation of ties with the Nazi cause challenge his carefully maintained veneer of servitude.Gloomy Sunday
1999-10-21Budapest in the thirties. The restaurant owner Laszlo hires the pianist András to play in his restaurant. Both men fall in love with the beautiful waitress Ilona who inspires András to his only composition. His song of Gloomy Sunday is, at first, loved and then feared, for its melancholic melody triggers off a chain of suicides. The fragile balance of the erotic ménage à trois is sent off kilter when the German Hans goes and falls in love with Ilona as well.The Chess Player
2017-05-05In 1934 Diego Padilla wins the Spanish Championship of Chess and meets a French journalist, Marianne Latour, and they fall in love. At the end of the Civil War, Marianne convinces Diego to live in France with their daughter, where shortly afterwards Diego will be accused of spying by the Nazis and imprisoned in an SS prison. In prison, Diego will try to survive in a hostile environment thanks to Colonel Maier's passion for chess.The Song of Names
2019-12-25A man searches for his childhood best friend, a Polish violin prodigy orphaned in the Holocaust, who vanished decades before on the night of his first public performance.