'Saving Private Ryan' without the schmaltzy overtones.

Rating: 10/10 (29 June 2008)

You couldn't really expect to make a 'typical' movie out of the story of last days of the archetypal fascist dictator. 'Untergang' seeks to illustrate the situation of 'sane' people under the control of a madman; that and the impending arrival of the Red Army is the only dramatic jeopardy available - no romantic interlude, nothing to achieve, no sentimental buddy rescue shtick. We witness the reactions of people like you and me (and don't be silly enough to imagine I include Goebbels, etc. - I mean people doing their jobs under impending calamity) who happened to be in the wrongest place at the wrongest time. If this dilemma doesn't absorb you, it's a fault of your imagination, not of the utterly brilliant recreation of something very few people survived to bear witness to. 'Untergang' doesn't seek to make a judgment of Hitler because it doesn't need to: all you need to appreciate is his increasing detachment from reality and the way that this divides the people stuck with him. If there's any sort of judgment, it's of the herd mentality of people as a whole. The film becomes a series of stunning docu-vignettes of the various levels of humanity involved, each one posing the question 'What would YOU have done?'. This film is thought-provoking, and that naturally makes many denizens of the internet uncomfortable.