Cruelty Has A Human Face... And Great Actor Behind It!

Rating: 9/10 (22 April 2005)

I haven't been so enthralled in a movie in a long time! Der Untergang was the last of the great 2004 movies left for me to watch after enjoying Million Dollar Baby, Vera Drake and Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind. After eagerly waiting for it to premiere in Portugal, I've finally seen it and it's as brilliant and beautiful as word of mouth would have one believe. Oliver Hirschbiegel, an unknown director to me until now, made what is to me one of the best movies in many years and easily one of the best gems of last year. I can't think of anything negative to say about it.
Technically, it's outstanding; it recreates the wrecked, chaotic Berlin of 1945 with as much accuracy and attention to detail as The Pianist recreates the Warsaw Ghetto. The beauty of the sets doesn't restrict itself to the open city but also to disturbingly clean, anti-septic scenes of Hitler's underground bunker, bathed in a bluish, pure light that contrasts bitterly with the horrors happening outside this fantasy world the dictator created for himself. The art directors should be commended along with the directors of photography. The sound in this movie is also another great aspect: the explosions, bombings, gun fires find their way into the story seamlessly; the bunker dwellers might be having a party in one moment only for a bomb to explore right next to them ruining their futile attempts at pretending everything's alright outside the bunker. Their downfall becomes more real to them as the sound of the Russian artillery keeps getting closer and closer, heightening their despair and runaway attempts. Only Hitler remains frighteningly calm amidst all this panic. I feel Der Untergang is a movie that was inexplicably short-changed on a lot of Oscar nominations.
I have no complaints from the cast either: most actors were unknown to me, except Thomas Kretschmann; and I didn't even know he was in the movie until I saw the poster at the theater. And yet everyone was brilliant in their particular roles; some were relatively short and others occupied a large bulk of the movie, but everyone was perfect! Obviously Bruno Ganz's unique performance will always overshadow anyone else's, but worthy of note are Alexandra Maria Lara, who plays Traudl Junge, Hitler's secretary who has a very touching relationship with the dictator; Christian Berkel, as an SS officer whose main concern is helping the civilian population when all the higher powers abandon them; Michael Mendl, playing General Weidling, who sees the madness of continuing to resist the Russian army's impeding advance; and Ulrich Matthes as Joseph Goebbels, a truly haunting performance as the man who keeps feeding Hitler with dangerous fantasies about victory even when defeat is obvious to everyone.
But it is Bruno Ganz who gives the performance of the movie: forget Clint Eastwood and Jim Carrey for their two fine performances in 2004; and do forget the overrated Jamie Foxx and Leonardo DiCaprio. Bruno Ganz gives one of the best performances I've ever seen in a movie. Ganz isn't just performing; he is really Adolf Hitler! He embodies with perfection the mannerisms, body language, voice of the tyrant! With a remarkable make-up that further transforms his semblance into Hitler's, Ganz completely transforms himself for this role. I've only seen Ganz in another movie before, a European co-production called In The White City: I hated it and hated Ganz. I never imagined only one year later I'd be praising this same actor. This isn't the Bruno Ganz of In The White City; this is one of the best modern actors playing his art to new heights! It's not easy to make Hitler a compelling, fascinating, and even human character; it's actually very easy to make him the inhuman monster, the raging, babbling lunatic we would like to think he was. But Ganz played Hitler with chilling complexity and that made the dictator look even more monstrous. It only makes this man look even crueler and callous when we admit he was also a man who loved playing with his dog, or enjoyed listening children singing to him, held polite conversations with people and liked to stroll. When one takes all this in it becomes more chilling how such a man could have given orders to kill millions. All his excuses are finally gone. I hope Bruno Ganz is proud of this role; I imagine it wasn't easy, but it's a treat for movie lovers. And again, one feels he was criminally missing at the Oscars.
Der Untergang is around 150 minutes long and remains entertaining until the end. The only reason I was looking at my watch sometimes was because I wanted to know how much longer I could be enjoying this experience; I just didn't want it to end. The story is interesting enough as it shows what's happening inside the bunker in the last days of the Reich. Although there's a cast huge enough to rival a Robert Altman movie, the movie never loses narrative coherence: it's always about Hitler and how Hitler's madness and growing weakness alienates many of his followers and just forces others to make interesting decisions; the political machinations, the back-stabbings, the plots, the desertions, the suicides are all result of this one central figure. Particularly chilling is the scene in which Magda Goebbels kills her six children with poison, then dies with her husband in suicide.
One of the best movies of 2004, Der Untergang is a fantastic cinematic experience. One shouldn't leave this movie for DVD rental, it needs to be enjoyed on a big screen for full effect.