# The Truce
**The Truce** (Italian: *La tregua*) is a 1997 drama film directed by Francesco Rosi, adapted from [Primo Levi](https://www.edgepedia.org/primo-levi)'s 1963 autobiographical memoir of the same name (published in English as *The Reawakening*). It follows the Italian-Jewish chemist Primo Levi, played by [John Turturro](https://www.edgepedia.org/john-turturro), on his long journey home to Turin after the liberation of Auschwitz by Soviet forces in 1945.[1](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1083373-truce) The film competed for the [Palme d'Or](https://www.edgepedia.org/palme-dor) at the 1997 Cannes Film Festival and won three David di Donatello awards in Italy.[2](https://cinegraph.org/movies/the-truce-1997) • [3](https://www.sif309.com/sif309/assets/sif309-production-list-1996.pdf) It was the last film Rosi directed before his death in 2015.[4](https://www.netflixmovies.com/the-truce-1997)
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Director / source | Francesco Rosi; adapted from Primo Levi's 1963 memoir *La tregua* (*The Reawakening*)[1](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1083373-truce) |
| Lead cast | John Turturro (Primo Levi), Rade Serbedzija (the Greek), Massimo Ghini (Cesare)[5](https://www.europeanfilmawards.eu/efa-movie/the-truce/) |
| Story | Levi's journey home to Turin after Auschwitz's liberation by Soviet forces in 1945, with stops across Eastern Europe[1](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1083373-truce) |
| Cannes | Competed for the Palme d'Or at the 50th Festival de Cannes, May 1997[2](https://cinegraph.org/movies/the-truce-1997) |
| Italian awards | Won David di Donatello for Best Film, Best Director, and Best Producer (1997)[3](https://www.sif309.com/sif309/assets/sif309-production-list-1996.pdf) |
| US reception | 53% on the Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer (15 reviews); US gross about $149.9K[1](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1083373-truce) |
| Significance | Rosi's final feature film[4](https://www.netflixmovies.com/the-truce-1997) |
## Spoilers
### Source and story
The film is based on Levi's second book, published in 1963, which recounts his return from Auschwitz: from the entry of Soviet troops into the camp to his long trek home via the USSR to Turin.[6](https://rm.coe.int/16804715a4) Levi, an Italian-Jewish chemist, had joined the Italian resistance during World War II, been arrested, and deported to Auschwitz; after liberation he travels with a shifting group of survivors, Italians along with Greek, French, Polish, Czech, and German exiles, across a Europe caught between war and peace.[7](https://jfi.org/programs/jfi-film-archive/the-truce) • [8](https://www.archiviodelcinemaitaliano.it/risultati/scheda?codice=MN0155) According to the Swiss film registry, his wanderings lasted ten months before he reached Turin and his mother and sister.[9](https://www.swissfilms.ch/en/movie/la-tregua/7bd1b33fe135433680b9465a2315ca64)
The journey passes through the black markets of Cracow and resettlement camps in Katowice, following [Red Army](https://www.edgepedia.org/red-army) convoys through a devastated landscape the European Film Academy synopsis describes as at once tragic and comic, epic and picaresque.[5](https://www.europeanfilmawards.eu/efa-movie/the-truce/) Along the way Levi meets a disenchanted Greek wheeler-dealer (Rade Serbedzija) who offers him lessons in survival, a Russian nurse (Agnieszka Wagner), and a violinist (Roberto Citran).[10](https://www.spiritualityandpractice.com/films/reviews/view/1336?id=1336) The film ends with Levi at home in Turin, seated at a typewriter, beginning to write.[8](https://www.archiviodelcinemaitaliano.it/risultati/scheda?codice=MN0155)
## Production
Rosi, born in Naples in 1922 and known for political films such as *Hands Over the City* (1963) and literary adaptations including *Christ Stopped at Eboli* (1979), had wanted to film Levi's work for years; he said he never considered adapting Levi's first memoir *If This Is a Man* because "it would be a sacrilege," but saw *The Truce* as a story a camera could show.[6](https://rm.coe.int/16804715a4) • [11](https://www.enotes.com/topics/primo-levi/criticism/criticism/thane-rosenbaum-essay-date-1998) He first approached John Turturro shortly after *Barton Fink* won the Golden Palm at Cannes in 1991.[12](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1997/04/28/if-not-now-when) It took five years to work out the script and financing, and filming ran 20 weeks, much of it on location in Ukraine, where the stark landscape and homesickness wore on the crew.[13](https://www.sfgate.com/entertainment/article/turturro-finds-inspiration-in-truce-s-levi-2833357.php) • [11](https://www.enotes.com/topics/primo-levi/criticism/criticism/thane-rosenbaum-essay-date-1998) Turturro lost more than 30 pounds for the role.[11](https://www.enotes.com/topics/primo-levi/criticism/criticism/thane-rosenbaum-essay-date-1998)
The production was marked by two deaths. The cinematographer Pasqualino De Santis, Rosi's longtime collaborator, died in Ukraine during the shoot, and the editor Ruggero Mastroianni died shortly before completing his work; Marco Pontecorvo and Bruno Sarandrea replaced them, and the film is dedicated to both men.[14](https://play.google.com/store/movies/details/La_tregua?hl=it&id=953458DF912A0218MV) The film was Rosi's most expensive, produced by Leo Pescarolo and Guido De Laurentiis with a multi-country co-production including 3 Emme Cinematografica, RAI, T&C Film, and partners in France, Germany, and Switzerland.[15](https://www.nemla.org/publications/journals/nis/issues/xlv/NIS_XLV_010_Marrone-Puglia.pdf) • [8](https://www.archiviodelcinemaitaliano.it/risultati/scheda?codice=MN0155)
## Release and reception
The film premiered in Levi's hometown of Turin in February 1997, two months before the tenth anniversary of Levi's suicide, and screened in competition at Cannes in May 1997.[16](https://www.jta.org/1997/06/05/default/holocaust-themes-featured-in-new-italian-produced-films) • [9](https://www.swissfilms.ch/en/movie/la-tregua/7bd1b33fe135433680b9465a2315ca64) It won three David di [Donatello](https://www.edgepedia.org/donatello) awards, for Best Film, Best Director (Rosi), and Best Producer (Guido De Laurentiis and Leo Pescarolo), with further nominations for screenplay, music, and supporting actress, and took the audience award at the Palić Film Festival.[3](https://www.sif309.com/sif309/assets/sif309-production-list-1996.pdf)
Critical response was divided. On Rotten Tomatoes the film holds a 53% Tomatometer from 15 reviews.[1](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1083373-truce) Stephen Holden of *The New York Times* called Turturro's performance possibly the screen performance of his career, while Rick Groen of *The Globe and Mail* wrote that the film fails to capture the fine moral discriminations of Levi's prose.[1](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1083373-truce) The film critic Adrian Martin judged Turturro's work the finest of his career to date but found Rosi's treatment cerebral and distant from the small sensations at the story's core.[17](https://adrianmartinfilmcritic.com/reviews/t/truce.html) A recurring criticism concerned language: the film was shot mostly in English, in broken and often hard-to-follow dialogue, which reviewers argued did a disservice to Levi's eloquence.[18](https://observer.com/1998/04/a-pair-of-girls-a-guy-and-two-hours-of-therapy/) • [19](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1998-apr-24-ca-42338-story.html) In the United States the film grossed about $149.9K.[1](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1083373-truce)
## Adaptation choices and controversy
Two departures from Levi's book drew particular attention. In the film's climax, a train of survivors pulls into Munich and a German soldier, seeing the Auschwitz mark on Levi's uniform, kneels in repentance; scholars note this scene is re-invented rather than drawn from the memoir.[11](https://www.enotes.com/topics/primo-levi/criticism/criticism/thane-rosenbaum-essay-date-1998) • [15](https://www.nemla.org/publications/journals/nis/issues/xlv/NIS_XLV_010_Marrone-Puglia.pdf) The character of the Greek and his refrain that "there is always war" (*guerra è sempre*) was likewise emphasized beyond the source.[15](https://www.nemla.org/publications/journals/nis/issues/xlv/NIS_XLV_010_Marrone-Puglia.pdf) A study of the liberation scene found it bears little resemblance to Levi's description apart from one quoted line, and that its shots of prisoners along the barbed wire resemble historical Soviet footage of Majdanek more than the famous Auschwitz images.[20](https://film-history.org/index.php/issues/text/liberated-film) The adaptation caused controversy in Italy, with critics charging exaggerated sentimentalization of the Shoah; the scholar Cosetta Veronese of the University of Bern has argued the film should instead be read as an autonomous work that renews Levi's role as witness and warns against revisionism.[21](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/249918945_Paying_the_price_of_perpetuating_memory_Francesco_Rosi%27s_interpretation_of_Primo_Levi%27sThe_Truce)
## The book behind the film
Levi's memoir sold 40,000 copies on publication in Italy in 1963 and established him among the front rank of Italian writers; the biographer Ian Thomson, who retraced Levi's route, notes it was among the first Western accounts of the postwar Soviet Union from the inside.[22](https://www.theguardian.com/film/2006/oct/14/primolevi) Filming the book had tempted Italian directors for decades: Mario Monicelli prepared a treatment by early 1964 with Alberto Sordi intended to star, but the project collapsed over financing, and Franca Films bought an option for 250,000 lire.[22](https://www.theguardian.com/film/2006/oct/14/primolevi) Thomson judged Rosi's eventual 1997 version disappointingly overblown and operatic, with Turturro an unlikely Levi.[22](https://www.theguardian.com/film/2006/oct/14/primolevi) Levi himself died in 1987, a decade before the film appeared.[16](https://www.jta.org/1997/06/05/default/holocaust-themes-featured-in-new-italian-produced-films)
## Versions and availability
Reported runtimes differ by source and version: 112 minutes for the US release, 120 minutes in the Swiss registry, 125 minutes in the [Council of Europe](https://www.edgepedia.org/council-of-europe)'s catalog, and 140 minutes in the Italian national film commission's entry.[23](https://www.justwatch.com/us/movie/the-truce) • [9](https://www.swissfilms.ch/en/movie/la-tregua/7bd1b33fe135433680b9465a2315ca64) • [6](https://rm.coe.int/16804715a4) • [24](https://www.commissionefilmcei.it/film/la-tregua/) The film is rated R in the United States for some language and sexual content, and is currently available on Prime Video and other streaming platforms.[1](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1083373-truce) • [23](https://www.justwatch.com/us/movie/the-truce)
## References
1. [The Truce, Rotten Tomatoes](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1083373-truce)
2. [The Truce, Cinegraph](https://cinegraph.org/movies/the-truce-1997)
3. [Production list 1996, San Sebastián / SIF309 awards compilation](https://www.sif309.com/sif309/assets/sif309-production-list-1996.pdf)
4. [The Truce (1997), NetflixMovies.com](https://www.netflixmovies.com/the-truce-1997)
5. [The Truce, European Film Academy](https://www.europeanfilmawards.eu/efa-movie/the-truce/)
6. [The Shoah on screen, Council of Europe](https://rm.coe.int/16804715a4)
7. [The Truce, Jewish Film Institute](https://jfi.org/programs/jfi-film-archive/the-truce)
8. [La tregua, Archivio del Cinema Italiano](https://www.archiviodelcinemaitaliano.it/risultati/scheda?codice=MN0155)
9. [La Tregua, Swiss Films](https://www.swissfilms.ch/en/movie/la-tregua/7bd1b33fe135433680b9465a2315ca64)
10. [The Truce review, Spirituality & Practice](https://www.spiritualityandpractice.com/films/reviews/view/1336?id=1336)
11. [Thane Rosenbaum, Imagining a Life after the Unimaginable, New York Times (1998)](https://www.enotes.com/topics/primo-levi/criticism/criticism/thane-rosenbaum-essay-date-1998)
12. [Michael Sragow, If Not Now, When?, The New Yorker (1997)](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1997/04/28/if-not-now-when)
13. [Mick LaSalle, Turturro Finds Inspiration in Truce's Levi, San Francisco Chronicle (1997)](https://www.sfgate.com/entertainment/article/turturro-finds-inspiration-in-truce-s-levi-2833357.php)
14. [La tregua, Google Play (Italian synopsis)](https://play.google.com/store/movies/details/La_tregua?hl=it&id=953458DF912A0218MV)
15. [Gaetana Marrone-Puglia, Francesco Rosi's La tregua: The Magic Realism of Memory](https://www.nemla.org/publications/journals/nis/issues/xlv/NIS_XLV_010_Marrone-Puglia.pdf)
16. [Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Holocaust themes featured in new Italian-produced films (1997)](https://www.jta.org/1997/06/05/default/holocaust-themes-featured-in-new-italian-produced-films)
17. [Adrian Martin, The Truce review (1997)](https://adrianmartinfilmcritic.com/reviews/t/truce.html)
18. [New York Observer, A Pair of Girls, a Guy And Two Hours of Therapy (1998)](https://observer.com/1998/04/a-pair-of-girls-a-guy-and-two-hours-of-therapy/)
19. [Los Angeles Times, Uneven 'Truce' Charts a Postwar Reawakening (1998)](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1998-apr-24-ca-42338-story.html)
20. [Ulrike Weckel, Liberated on Film, Research in Film and History](https://film-history.org/index.php/issues/text/liberated-film)
21. [Cosetta Veronese, Paying the price of perpetuating memory, Studies in European Cinema (2008)](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/249918945_Paying_the_price_of_perpetuating_memory_Francesco_Rosi%27s_interpretation_of_Primo_Levi%27sThe_Truce)
22. [Ian Thomson, Railroad odyssey, The Guardian (2006)](https://www.theguardian.com/film/2006/oct/14/primolevi)
23. [The Truce streaming, JustWatch](https://www.justwatch.com/us/movie/the-truce)
24. [La tregua, Commissione Nazionale Valutazione Film](https://www.commissionefilmcei.it/film/la-tregua/)
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*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Individual films by title and year › Drama and biographical films (individual works) › Drama films 1970s › Released 1970 to 1974*
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