Downfall

Oliver Hirschbiegel's Downfall (2004) is a disturbing, perversely fascinating film depicting the end of Nazi Germany. Making excellent use of an ensemble cast and excellent script, it uses the Third Reich's final days to show how sick and depraved it was.

April 1945. Nazi Germany is on its last legs, with the Red Army on Berlin's doorstep and the capital reduced to rubble. In the Reichstag Bunker, Adolf Hitler (Bruno Ganz) and his cohorts try to run the country, still deluded with hope of victory. Hitler's loyal secretary Traudl Junge (Alexandra Maria Lara) grows disturbed by Hitler's erratic behavior and rages, debating whether to stand by her Fuhrer or try and escape. At ground level, fighting rages in the streets, with poorly-armed Hitler Youths and die-hard SS troops opposing Soviet tank columns. Defiant General Weidling (Michael Mendl) is spared from execution only to be put in charge of the city's defense; SS Doctor Ernest-Gunther Schenck (Christian Berkel) desperately tries to help wounded soldiers. As defeat becomes inevitable, Hitler, wife Eva Braun (Juliane Kohler), Joseph Goebbels (Ulrich Matthes) and others decide to die rather than live in a world without National Socialism.

Innumrable books and films have explored facets of Nazism: its hypnotic and domineering leader, its political strength and popular appeal, its criminal and genocidal nature, its monstrous warmaking, even its perverse sexual elements. The objectively evil Nazis are catch-all bad guys in Hollywood, and a convenient punching bag for bellicose pundits: how many asinine "Bush=Hitler" comparisons have been aired the past ten years? It's easy to dismiss discussion of Nazism as cliche (especially if you're Pat Buchanan or David Irving), but there's a reason it's discussed sixty-five years later: Nazi Germany was the purest distillation of human evil in history. Good authors and filmmakers know there are still lessons to be mined from the Third Reich, and Hirschbiegel finds many.

Downfall portrays Berlin as a living Gotterdamerung: Hitler and Co. obliviously cling to hope of victory; Nazi fanatics fight to the last, preparing for death one way or the other; Heinrich Himmler, Albert Speer and others try and escape; others drink, whore and celebrate, resigned to their fate. It's a bacchanalia of death and destruction, with attempts of retaining normality (Eva Braun's dance party during an artillery barrage, Hitler's wedding, the Goebbels children singing a Nazi anthem) striking perverse notes. No film has captured the hideous, dying spasms of a monstrous regime more thoroughly and disturbingly than Downfall.

Most of all, the film shows the logical ends of fanaticism. Hitler's insane rants seem tame compared to actions of his devoted followers: the scene where Goebbels's wife (Corinna Harfouch) methodically poisons her sleeping children is truly horrifying, a portrait of pure evil at work. Above ground, teenaged Hitler Youths and SS soldiers kill each other rather than surrender, and roving gangs of Gestapo thugs lynch anyone found in civilian clothes. Murder is second nature in a Fascist regime, where loyalty to an ephemeral, unattainable cause supercedes family ties, self-preservation and human decency.

If there's any criticism to be had, it's that the scenes outside the Fuhrerbunker are often lacking. The details are extremely effective, but the overarching subplots are ill-used and don't amount to much; certainly they lack the vicious intensity of the scenes inside the Bunker. After Hitler and Goebbels pass on, the movie drags out for another half-hour, losing much of its narrative drive as our surviving protagonists try and escape.

Hirschbiegel's direction is straight-forward but well-done. There are no big battle scenes, just snippets of violence in the streets, with Rainier Klausmann's stark photography emphasizing the chaos and hopelessness of the situation. The bunker itself is wonderfully used, its claustrophobia trapping Hitler and Co. rather than isolating them, and proving a suitable crypt.

Bruno Ganz is inevitably the center of the film. He is absolutely rivetting as Hitler, conveying the Fuhrer's unspooling madness, his destructive nature, and occasionally conveying a humanity that makes his destructive evil that much more chilling. I do not agree with critics who claim that Ganz makes Hitler sympathetic: they make him human. There's a huge difference. Ganz is a good enough actor to recognize this, and gives one of the decade's best performances.

The rest of the cast is no less impressive. The incredibly beautiful Alexandra Maria Lara (The Baader-Meinhoff Complex) shines: her Traudl is neither innocent nor fanatical, but convincingly an ordinary girl in an impossible situation. Juliane Kohner is equally impressive, playing Eva a flighty girl who would never think to question the Fuhrer. The rat-faced Ulrich Matthes makes a truly hideous Goebbels, with Corinna Harfouch equally repulsive as his wife. Christian Berkel (Inglourious Basterds) does well in a small but crucial role, but Thomas Kretschmann (Valkyrie) is ill-used.

Downfall is a fascinating, horrifying film. It is perhaps cinema's best depiction of Nazi Germany's perverse evil, showing that even the hoariest subject can be made fascinating.