Downfall [DVD]
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Movie Reviews of Downfall [DVD]
Movie Review: An extraordinary achievement
Summary: 5 Stars
This is the story of the last days of Adolf Hitler as the Russians remorselessly close in on the Führerbunker. It is told partially through the eyes of Traudl Junge, Hitler's secretary, and the film begins and ends with the real Traudl Junge speaking (she died in 2002). The film proper starts with the midnight selection as a secretary for Hitler of Fräulein Gertraud Humps (Junge was her married name) from among 5 hopefuls, mainly, the film suggests, because she came from Munich, with which Hitler had close connections and for which he had much affection.
The really good thing about this film is Swiss actor Bruno Ganz's portrayal of Hitler. One can't imagine anyone ever doing it better. Everything, the tantrums of rage, the loss of reality and refuge in fantasy, the intrusion of bitter reality, the ever-shaking hand, which he sought to hide, all brilliantly captured. I was pleased to see that they subtitled the film rather than dubbed it; Hitler never lost his Austrian accent and Ganz's coarse accent stands in sharp contrast to those of the polished Hochdeutsch speakers around him). Ganz's Hitler is a train crash in slow motion as his worlds, real and fantasy, collapse around him and his closest followers (Goering, even Himmler "der treue Heinrich") seek to save their own skins. I've heard criticisms that this portrayal of Hitler makes him too human, but this, to me, makes the portrait that much more effective. After all, all this death and destruction was not brought about by aliens from another planet, but by people from this one, and moreover from a nation that has given the world so much, especially in the field of great music. I suspect that people like the "monster" portrait, because they can then distance themselves from the monster ("we're not like THAT"). However, this is the monster that lurks within us all and all it needs is the right circumstances to bring it forth. It should be remembered that the current allegedly Christian President of the USA is happy to have people tortured. The slippery slope is not as far away as you think.
You look at this wreckage of a person so beautifully played by Ganz and wonder, why on earth did all these people follow him to the bitter end? In one scene, Goebbels in close to tears when Hitler orders him to leave Berlin and confides to Traudl Junge that he will disobey a Führer order for the first time. In another scene, Magda Goebbels intimates to Albert Speer that she will kill her six children (all of whose Christian names start with "H" in admiration for Hitler). "I beg you to reconsider, Magda," protests Speer, "those children deserve a future." "There is no future without National Socialism," replies Frau Goebbels. She is seen later breaking cyanide capsules in their mouths (having first given them all a sleeping potion), before she and her husband commit suicide (true, but depicted inaccurately). Why this determination to remain with an obviously sinking ship? In an era where fanaticism of all kinds is again on the rise, we need to understand why and disseminate the answers and lessons more widely. The current state of the world is evidence that we have not done so very well.
The world of the collapsing Third Reich is beautifully (if that's the word) captured, with people partying wildly as the world falls apart around them, fanatics stringing up "defeatists" from the lamp posts, even as obvious and very real defeat looms, the fanatical kids of the Hitler Youth trying courageously but vainly to stop the Russian onslaught, even the German guards carrying Sturmgewehre, early assault rifles of the type that Mr. Kalsahnikov would later make famous.
So, what are the negatives? Only one really; the film smacks a little of a whitewash, of portraying to some extent the Germans as the innocent victims of the deranged Nazis, so that the Germans don't feel too bad. I confess I don't know the history in any great detail, but when an SS Brigadeführer (brigadier-general) starts to worry about civilian casualties and the death of the elderly, I start to wonder. The soldiers are all terribly honourable and sensible - it's the rabid Nazis of the film, such as Josef Goebbels (chillingly played by Ulrich Matthes) who want to fight to the end for the Führer and who are totally callous of human life. Most of all, there's the central figure of Traudl Junge, played as a wide-eyed ingénue by the delicious Alexandra Maria Lara. Nicely played to be sure, but was this really how it was? After all, she married a Waffen-SS officer (killed in Normandy), and THEY were the prime examples of Nazi racial ideology (the fact that she was married and widowed is not mentioned in the film). At the beginning, the real Traudl Junge says that she was never an enthusiastic National Socialist and at the end she related her shock and shame at finding that fellow Münchenerin, the heroic Sophie Scholl of the White Rose resistance group, was born in the same year and was en route to the guillotine as Junge took the Hitler job. And when Hitler dictates his political testament to Junge, should she have looked so shocked at the bit about the enemy International Jewry? Perhaps there's more than an uncomfortable element of truth in a statement by Goebbels, when he says dismissively to the abovementioned SS Brigadeführer words to the effect of "it's the people's fault, they voted for this."
In conclusion, in spite of my pernickety reservations, an outstanding film, well worth seeing.
Movie Review: Sleep tight children
Summary: 5 Stars
As a Brit I grew up immersed in both the myth and reality of the Second World War, for instance, I remember as a child in London during the 60's that parts of the city were still derelict from the Blitz, and unexploded German bombs would turn up on construction sites every so often, having been buried for all those years!
Probably the most heavily mythologized aspect of WWII was our "Finest Hour," the "Battle of Britain," where a bunch of very splendid chaps, hopelessly outnumbered, took on the might of the German Luftwaffe, getting their crates into the air and flying off to meet Jerry over the Channel. We could also enjoy tales of equally splendid chaps, spending their time tunneling out of "escape-proof" camps overseen by sneering, jack-booted Commandants, and totally inept guards.
So I was intrigued when I heard about a German film that concentrated on Hitler's final twelve days in the Berlin Fuhrerbunker, especially as it purported to show Hitler as a "Human Being," and not just a ranting, anti-Semitic, frothing-at-the-mouth mad-man.
If I had doubted the claims of a "human" Hitler, the film immediately proves its case with a low-key beginning; a group of young women are led through a military checkpoint to an underground facility, the Bunker. They are to be interviewed by the Fuhrer himself for the position of his personal secretary; he moves along the line asking each woman her name and where they're from, each answers stiffly and ends with a, "Mien Fuhrer!" After the second or third girl answers in this fashion, the dictator tut-tuts, and good-naturedly tells them to forget all about the formalities and just answer the questions; he's looking for a secretary, not a general! The last girl in the line, Traudl Junge catches his eye, and is invited into his office for a typing test. Hitler starts to read from hand-written notes, Traudl tries to keep up, but nerves cause her to makes a complete mess of it; the Fuhrer looks over her shoulder and kindly suggests that they try again.
I have to admit that this beginning threw me completely, but there was more to come, we see generals bravely defending their troops against Hitler's hysterical charges of cowardice - and genuinely risking their lives in doing so - Albert Speer, "Hitler's Architect," begging the Fuhrer not to proceed with a "scorched earth" policy that would only hurt the Volk, the German people, and later facing Hitler to tell him he had personally disobeyed his direct orders in this regard. We see Reichsfuhrer Heinrich Himmler, the primary architect of the "Final Solution" to the "Jewish question," discussing how to save the Nazi German state after the death of Hitler, by negotiating a peace with Britain and America, and even the old monster Joseph Goebbles, Hitler's Propaganda Minister, is allowed a moment of humanity, reaching out to comfort his wife after she murdered their children.
The film is told almost entirely from the viewpoint of Traudl, and this is not surprising as her autobiography, "Until the final hour," is one of the primary sources for the production; what we see is, for the most part, what she either saw, or overheard.
The production values are superb, and this is especially true of the Fuhrerbunker itself, cramped and claustrophobic, it's not, I'm sure, what most people would have expected. The scenes "above ground," as it were, are equally well realized, and you really feel that you are watching one of the great cities of Europe burning and being blasted to hell by the advancing Russian troops.
But the heart of this film is, of course, Bruno Ganz's superb portrayal of Hitler; it is, as the jacket says, "A performance for the ages!" What we are given is a man, no matter how evil or despotic, instead of a ranting caricature or parody, something the actor says he was worried about. Over the course of the film we see the Fuhrer's physical condition, as well as his mental state, rapidly deteriorate, stricken by the early stages of a Parkinson's type condition, he becomes frail, but increasingly paranoid, leading to volcanic outbursts against his own officers, the German people as a whole, and, of course, the Jews of Europe.
Whilst these scenes can be difficult to watch, the most harrowing sequence is the murder of the six Goebbles children by their own mother, Magda. A true fanatic who worshiped her Fuhrer almost as a God, she was unable to countenance them living in a world devoid of National Socialism. So, with the death of Hitler she drugged each of the children with morphine, then, once they were unconscious, fed each of them a cyanide capsule in what has to be one of the most cold-blooded acts of infanticide ever perpetrated.
IMHO, Downfall is an extraordinary achievement, and is completed by a prologue and epilogue spoken by Traudl Junge herself. This film easily stands alongside productions such as "The World At War," the BBC's "History of World War II," "Das Boot," and "Schindler's List;" it should be seen by the widest possible audience... I simply cannot recommend it highly enough!
I would also recommend, for once, that viewers watch the "Making Of" feature. A fascinating piece, it has the, mostly, German actors talking about portraying the monsters from their own past, including one actor who lost his entire maternal family, apart from his grandmother and two cousins, in the Camps!
Movie Review: A German film about the last ten days of the Third Reich
Summary: 5 Stars
"Der Untergang" (Downfall) is a German production (filmed in Petersberg, Russia ironically enough) that tells the story of the last ten days of Third Reich, told mainly from the perspective of those in the bunker of Adolf Hitler. But it begins with a scene from 1942 when young Traudl Junge (Alexandra Maria Lara) is hired by the Fuehrer as a secretary. Then we jump ahead to Berlin in 1945, with the Soviet army enclosing the city and Frau Junge still by Hitler's side. The screenplay by Bernd Eichinger is based on not only Junge's memoir, "Until the Final Hour" (written with Melissa Muller), but also Joachim Fest's "Inside Hitler's Bunker." Junge's story was told in a 2002 documentary, "Im toten Winkel - Hitlers Sekretärin" ("Blind Spot: Hitler's Secretary"), which I will be watching next week. I decided I watched to watch this dramatization first and then watch the documentary. The real Junge, who died in 2002, appears at the beginning and end of "Der Untergang," providing a context for the story in keep with our perspective on Hitler and Nazi Germany from the vantage point of the start of the 21st century.
Basically what we have here with "Der Untergang" is a horror movie. Director Oliver Hirschbiegel makes it clear that the machinery of destruction did not stop with the death of Hitler, which is why this 2004 film is about the last ten days of the Third Reich rather than just the last ten days of the life of Adolf Hitler. In fact the deaths of Hitler and Eva Bruan take place off question with the sound of the bullet that Hitler shot through his brain letting us know the Fuehrer is tote. Throughout the film Hirschbiegel makes a point of refraining from showing us Nazis shooting themselves, choosing most of the time to show us their corpses (yes, there are some exceptions to this rule, but by the time the camera pans away right before Joseph Goebbels (Ulrich Matthes) shoots his wife Magda (Corinna Harfouch) and then himself, the point has been made. The voyeuristic emphasis here is not on death but the fact that even with Soviet artillery shelling Berlin and Soviet troops a few hundred meters away, there were so many Nazi officers who were willing to fight to the end or blow their brains out to follow their Fuehrer off to Hell.
Traudl Junge is a spectator to most of what goes on and we know that she is going to survive what is to come just as we know that Hitler will not. Consequently there are other figures who emerge as being more interesting because we do not know if they are going to get out of Berlin alive. For me the two key characters because Professor Werner Haase (Matthias Habich), a member of the S.S. who thinks it is long past time that the insanity stopped, and young Peter Kranz (Donevan Gunia), decorated by Hitler for having destroyed two Soviet tanks with his bazooka and embarrassed by having his father (Karl Kranzkowski) try to drag him off the front line because the war is lost and he wants his son to come out of it alive. One thing that this movie makes clear is that being a good German (to wit, wanting the nation to survive) has absolutely nothing to do with being a good Nazi (to wit, death before, during or after defeat), but perhaps its greatest strength is in showing the environment that can help us understand (but not accept) why it is nobody ever just pulled out their pistol and blew Hitler's brains out long before he did it himself.
I cannot speak to the authenticity of the events depicted, but they certainly ring true and hold with what historical details I do know about those last days in the Bunker. Hirschbiegel even adds an additional element of horror to Magda Goebbels's murder of her six children but having one of them fight being administered the sleeping potion that would allow her mother to slip a cyanide capsule into her mouth. As for Bruno Ganz's portrayal of Adolf Hitler, what I think I got out of watching the film is that Hitler was nice to women and that they worshipped him, some, such as Hanna Reitsch (Anna Thalbach), more than others. But whether it was simply ingrained manners or a measured response to deep adoration, it is hard to tell. Not that it matters much in the end, because even if Hitler can be seen as being human that does not make him any less of a monster.
In fact, it can serve to magnify the horror. When Hitler marries Ava Braun the presiding official is required by the Race Laws of Nazi Germany to ask the Fuehrer and his bride if they are of pure Aryan origins. Given that the Nazi ideal is a tall, clean shaven, curly haired blond Bavarian and Hitler is a short man with a dishevelled mop of dark hair and a Charlie Chaplin mustache who came from Austria, it seems obvious to me that Hitler is one of the least Aryan looking Nazis. But you do get a sense of Hitler's charisma and the power he holds over these others is clearly absolute. Even as Berlin is crumbling the Nazi's struggle to order remains paramount, and if there is any clear contrast between Nazi Germany and modern America it is that the government can make all the calls for order that it wants, but we are not willing to simply shut up and go along like sheep to the slaughter.
Movie Review: "Tomorrow millions will curse me - but fate has already set it's course"
Summary: 5 Stars
There have been many misconceptions about this film. I first heard about it because many people had accused it of looking sympathetically at Hitler, while others claim it ignores the suffering of the Jews. After watching the film at last and learning in depth what went behind it, I can conclude those people really have no idea what they are talking about.
"The Downfall" is the story of the last days of the Third Reich, one of the most destructive forces in the history of mankind, taken almost entirely from the point of view of Traudl Junge. (Hitler's personal secretary) The Russians are now at the edge of the city and Germany's great capitol is engulfed in chaos. "Operation Clausewitz" is put into effect, and high Nazi officials leave Berlin to continue the war outside the city, Hitler himself choosing to stay behind with many top military and personal advisors including Minister of Propaganda Joseph Goebbels...and his entire family.
As the Reich collapses on the outside, it continually draws itself in. Hitler retreats to his bunker, staying there almost indefinately for the entire movie. Friends and allies around him either flee or betray him, isolating him with his madness. The bunker takes on a very claustrophobic feel as the Third Reich crumbles, destructive men causing their own destruction. Thousands of Nazis commit suicide or fight and die for a cause they believe in. Even after Hitler dies (and if you think that's a spoiler, slap yourself in the head) the Reich continues to exist. It isn't until word comes that the German army has surrendered that fighting finally comes to an end, and even then loyal Nazis readily put guns to their heads and pull the trigger, finding it dishonorable to outlive their Fuhrer.
The accusations on the film making Hitler appear sympathetic are due to one of the goals of the filmmakers: make a picture about the Nazis not as caricatures but as real people. This doesn't mean they didn't think the Nazis were bad - listen to the interviews of the actors and film crew, and listen to how every minute they describe the characters as diabolical monsters. The purpose of this, as the director points out in the commentary, (by the way, my compliments to Oliver Hirschbiegel for his excellent English) was to keep ourselves from repeating what had happened. The Nazis didn't see the Jews as people and so could easily kill them - if we don't see the Nazis as people, then we are no better. It also reminds us that evil is not incarnate because a guy looks evil or because a guy belongs to a particular group of society - evil is found within the human heart itself. Hitler was recorded as a man who had a great charm, and could easily win your heart as much as fear him. Bruno Ganz carries this off EXTREMELY well, and has to be the best portrayel of Hitler I've ever seen on screen. He plays Hitler as he was - an actor and true politician that would smile to a friend or lady, then turn around and scream at the generals to get them to do what he wanted.
As a historical film, it excels above others in its genre. Nearly everything said or done is taken from eyewitness accounts, making you feel like you truly are watching history unfold. The urban combat scenes are the best I've seen, with no gunfire quieting when characters speak, no artificial lighting; everything's dirty, grimy, character's yell at one another, gunfire blasts louder than a person can stand - it's war! The actors all turn in great performances, even those who did not want to take the role (Ulrich Matthes almost turned down the role of Goebbels because of how horrible he was) or had trouble doing it. (Corinna Harfouch, herself a mother of three, broke down crying several times during the sequence where Goebbels' children are killed) Even Aline Sokar, who plays Helga Goebbels, is memorable, and you won't soon forget the scene where she tearfully begs her mother to not make her drink the "medicine."
The DVD comes with a making of documentary, which shows filming in St. Petersburg (!) as well as interviews with the various actors, even André Hennicke who plays Mohnke. There is also the already mentioned commentary with director Oliver Hirschbiegel, and any one who thinks this film is pro-Nazi is encouraged to listen to the commentary to learn otherwise. Hirschbiegel explains a lot of the historical facts (the man definately did his research) and reasoning behind this film.
A classic war film, German or otherwise, and perhaps the best depiction of the Third Reich to date. Watch it, and enter a world that seduced an entire nation and drove them to war. A world that is self-destructive, both metaphorically and physically. A world where parents kill their children without emotion, men kill their families, and where followers of a cause are oblivious to it's own end. It is true madness, but what makes this film haunting is it is all here, realisticly depicted and unadulterated. These men really existed, and rose to great power - we must always remember to try and prevent these men from entering power again.
Movie Review: WHAT A REAL & TRAGIC DEPICTION OF THE COLLAPSE OF THE NAZI REICH
Summary: 5 Stars
FIRST THOUGHTS ABOUT 'DOWNFALL': BEST FILM DEPICTING THE END OF THE THIRD REICH THAT I HAVE YET SEEN IS DONE SO WELL IT IS TRULY PAINFUL TO SEE
DOWNFALL is NOT a film you watch to quietly pass a few pleasant hours. In Downfall, the viewer has a front-row seat and there is much here one may not wish to see or to allow children to see. Essentially, this is gritty, harsh stuff depicting the end of the most tragic and convulsive period in history. That's right, Berlin during the last week of April, 1945 and, more specifically, in and around Hitler's bunker with Adolph Hitler as the central character.
IN A NUTSHELL -- DOWNFALL MAINTAINS AN ATMOSPHERE OF TRAGIC DESPERATION FOR 2.5 HOURS
Basically, everything that is depicted in this film has been documented and is true to historic fact, so there are no real surprises to anyone that has studied the Third Reich. Nevertheless, from beginning to end, the viewer is steeped in the tragic circumstances of the soon-to-be beaten Germans. Somehow, it seems very sad and pitiful. Hitler seems like a tragic figure, while Doctor and Frau Goebbels seem like the parents from a horror movie and their sweet, cute children don't know that their parents are the monsters. There is a whole subplot involving the final disposition of the Goebbels' children that might best be skipped over for some viewers. It is all quite true, but truly gruesome.
WHAT IT'S ALL ABOUT -- HITLER'S GERMANY IS DISINTEGRATING & WE ALL HAVE FRONT ROW SEATS
The real question here is --- DO WE REALLY WANT TO SEE IT? Put simply, this film is an honest-to-goodness downer! If you are prone to feeling blue or miserable from witnessing human misery, you will feel pretty low after this. That's because this is both very realistic and based on historic fact so that, after the film, one cannot take comfort from the knowledge that this was only a movie. The truth is that this film gets as close to the truth as any has to date, but the actual gut-wrenching experience of being in Berlin during this final curtain call for the Third Reich is beyond description. Frankly, those that survived [and so many died horribly] like Traudl Junge (played by Alexandra Maria Lara) were put into such a state of shock that they never recovered from the experience. Having Traudl Junge's experiences incorporated into the film as a viewpoint character adds perspective and humanizes this last week of the New Germany beyond where the historic source material, provided chiefly by Joachim C. Fest, could have taken it.
ABOUT BRUNO GANZ AS ADOLF HITLER:
Ganz gives the best rendition of Chancellor Hitler to date. He is a surprisingly-sympathetic character who is literally being buried alive by the weight of the calamities surrounding him. He appears to be poorly served by his inner circle who are waiting around for him to come up with some brillant master stroke to save everyone's bacon. Of course, Hitler knows he can't pull a rabbit out of his hat this time, and that fact is killing him right in front of our eyes. His coping skills fail him as he turns first on his followers and then the German people as a whole. Clearly, Hilter was pretty much losing his sanity at this point and everyone seemed to simply lean all the more on him as things grew darker. Small wonder he shot himself and took poison along with his new bride [she took only poison in order to avoid tarnishing her looks, before the petrol treatment, that is.]
PRETTY MUCH EVERYTHING THAT IS SHOWN IS HORRIBLE [ALTHOUGH MUCH OF THE HORROR WAS NOT SHOWN]:
Yes, we see children being armed and then killed defending Berlin. We see the wounded and the civilians being pushed aside like fodder and we see the death of a great culture in Berlin itself. Throughout this film, one indeed gets the impression that it is far easier to destroy than to create. We see a lot of destruction and self-destruction, such as Germans executing their own people at the very end and then killing themselves. Generals of the Army [Jodl - Keitel] were later executed anyway at Nuremburg, so perhaps they had the right idea.
Bruno Ganz deserves an Academy Award and Alexandra Maria Lara and Julianne Kohler are true standouts. The casting and the acting in this film are first-rate and many of the characters (Joseph Goebells, in particular) bear uncanny resemblance to their true counterparts.
BOTTOM LINE: RAW HISTORY -- SORRY, NO HAPPY ENDINGS HERE
"Downfall' is a phenomenal film that uses the cold historic facts of sources like Joachim C. Fest's "Inside Hitler's Bunker" to get the story correct. It then adds the additional humanizing effect of Traudl Junge's memoirs, which are effectively inserted into the film from its first scene until its last.
ALSO RECOMMENDED: HITLER: THE LAST 10 DAYS, 1973, ALEC GUINNESS