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The Search
Directed by	Fred Zinnemann
Produced by	Lazar Wechsler
Written by	Richard Schweizer (also story) David Wechsler (also story) Paul Jarrico Montgomery Clift Betty Smith
Starring	Montgomery Clift Aline MacMahon Jarmila Novotna Wendell Corey Ivan Jandl Mary Patton
Music by	Robert Blum
Cinematography	Emil Berna
Editing by	Hermann Haller
Distributed by	Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM)
Release date(s)	March 23, 1948
Running time	105 min.
Language	English
IMDb profile

The Search is a 1948 film directed by Fred Zinnemann which tells the story of a young Auschwitz survivor and his mother who search for each other across postwar Europe. It stars Montgomery Clift, Ivan Jandl, Jarmila Novotna and Aline MacMahon.

One oft cited feature of this film is that many of the scenes were shot amidst the actual ruins of post-war German cities, namely Ingolstadt, Nuremburg, and Würzburg. [1]

The film begins in documentary style at a post-World War II railway station. Trains bring homeless children (Displaced Persons or DPs) who are taken by Mrs. Murray (Aline MacMahon) and other United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNNRA) workers to a nearby transit camp, where they are fed and cared for.

The next morning, the children are interviewed by UNNRA officials to try to identify them and reunite them if possible with their families. One boy causes a problem, responding to all questions with, “Ich weiß nicht” (“I don’t know”).

The boy is Karel (Ivan Jandl). He grew up in a well-to-do Czech family. The Nazis had deported his father, and the boy and mother were sent to a Nazi concentration camp, where they became separated. After the war, Karel survived by scavenging for food and mingling with other homeless children.

The next day, the children are split up into groups and loaded into ambulances to be transferred to other camps. The children are at first terrified because the Nazis often used ambulances to gas victims, but are eventually coaxed into the vehicles.

During the trip, the smell of exhaust fumes causes Karel’s group to panic and escape out the back door of their ambulance, scattering in all directions. Karel and another boy named Raoul are chased by two of the UNRRA men. The boys try to swim across a river. Raoul drowns, but Karel survives by hiding in the reeds near the shoreline.

Later, Karel encounters an American army engineer, Steve (Montgomery Clift), who takes the boy home and takes care of him. He starts teaching the boy English. Because the boy cannot speak at first, Steve names him Jimmy.

Once Jimmy feels more secure, he starts to remember his mother and has images of the last time he saw her, near a fence in the concentration camp, in his mind. He runs away one evening thinking the fence is nearby. Jimmy finds a fence outside a nearby factory, but cannot find his mother among the workers leaving work.

Steve eventually finds Jimmy and tells him that his mother is dead (Steve has reason to believe she had been gassed) so he won't keep running away to look for her. He also informs Jimmy that he is going to try to adopt him and take him to America to start a new life there.

As it turns out, Karel's mother, Mrs. Malik (Jarmila Novotna) is not dead. In a parallel story, she has been searching for her son. She begins working for Mrs. Murray at the same UNRRA camp where her son had been processed. After a while though, she resigns to resume her forlorn search for Karel.

That same day, Steve leaves the boy at the UNRRA camp because he has a job waiting for him in America. He hopes to send for the boy once the paperwork is completed. Mrs. Murray remembers the boy from when he was there before; she begins to suspect that Jimmy is Mrs. Malek’s son. She hurries to the train station to bring Mrs. Malek back, but is too late. The train has already left. Then, she sees Mrs. Malek on the train platform; she had changed her mind and decided to stay. Mrs. Murray arranges for her to greet the newest group of children.

The film ends with Jimmy joining the group. Mrs. Malik begins to organize the children and bids them to follow her. Jimmy walks past without recognizing her. Mrs. Malik almost makes the same mistake, but then turns and calls, “Karel!” and the boy and his mother are reunited.

It won a special Juvenile Academy Award for Ivan Jandl, "for the outstanding juvenile performance of 1948 in The Search" and the Academy Award for Best Story. It was nominated for Best Actor in a Leading Role (Montgomery Clift), Best Director and Best Writing, Screenplay.