It is 1942. You see a naive young man who is good at boxing and pleased to get into an elite Nazi school. Makes friends with the son of a high Nazi official. But increasingly sees the faults in the system.
I found it done well, showing how an ordinary person could be part of the system.
I had somehow missed this film, despite watching a lot of war and German Nazi movies. Thank goodness I found it.
Made by the director of THE WAVE a brilliant film too about youngsters who get caught up via indoctrination and brainwashing into conforming to extremism - this too made me think of the woke brainwashing of now, by education systems and the media.
The actor Tom Schilling debuted here - he was superb in GENERATION WAR 2013.
This film has a genuinely emotional pull, as its characters are well-written and there is plenty of action and events to give momentum.
as ever with such films I do wonder if it is true most Germans did not know of horrors being committed and how many knew and how much they knew.
Anyway, superb script, tragic story, and the stats at the end - there were 40 of these schools training hardline loyal Nazi boys at the end of the war, and of the 15000 who went from them to fight a forlorn battle with the Russians, half were killed.
Brilliant. 5 stars