It's amazing and unbelievably realistic... Go see it people, NOW!!!

Rating: 10/10 (15 February 2005)

Having a huge interest in both World Wars and all that happened during the time period 1910-1950, I've seen a lot of movies and read even more books on the subject. Name me a more or less realistic war movie and I've probably seen it, so when "Der Untergang" was first released in Germany, I already knew I wanted to watch it as soon as it would be released over here. The commotion that it caused, the good critics that it got, all made me look forward to the day that I would see it, but really nothing could prepare me for what I saw... It was amazing, it was great, it was jaw-dropping...
The main criticism that many people had on this movie was that Hitler and the other Nazi party members looked too human. I know, some people expect that the leaders of the Third Reich are only shown as real monsters, as people who didn't have any human feelings... But that's not the truth. The truth is that, no matter how horrible the things they did, they still were human and (most of the time) acted like normal human beings (for instance Hitler who really loved his German shepherd or who had one of Goebbels' children sitting on his lap while they were singing a song for him...). And let's be honest: do you think a leader who doesn't care for his people's destiny after the war, who doesn't want to see the truth that the war is lost, who knows all too well that he sends young children into battle (he even decorates them personally), but doesn't care, a man who can be so kind and sweet one moment and than be furious and outraged the other moment, really looks like a kind, sweet grandfather??? I don't think so. The makers of this movie never intended to make him look like a nice or a bad man, they intended to show him the way he really was and they did an amazing job.
I've seen many documentaries about Hitler and read a lot of books about the man, so I think I can say I know quite well how he acted and reacted. Seeing Bruno Ganz as Hitler was a shock. He doesn't just look like Hitler, he IS Hitler in this movie!!! His performance was absolutely amazing and seeing him in this film really made shivers going down my spine. Hitler seemed to be alive again! If you've read so many books about the man as I did, you can only conclude that the resemblance is more than just remarkable, it is perfect.
But of course there were more actors in the movie than Bruno Ganz (an actor who I admire since I saw "Pane e Tulipani" or "Bread and Tulips" for the first time). Even though I have to admit that I don't really know any of them, I must say that they all did an excellent job. Juliane Köhler as Eva Brown, Corinna Harfouch as Magda Goebbels, Alexandra Maria Lara as Traudl Junge, Ulrich Matthes as Joseph Goebbels,... They all must have studied there characters for many hours, because they were all excellent.
As the horror and reality of the movie have only just ended and burned themselves on your retina for the rest of your life (By the end of the movie, you'll have seen many officers commit suicide, Hitler and Eva Brown being burned behind the bunker, the Goebbels murdering their children, people being hanged on a lantern for stupid reasons, young children dying as they try to defend Berlin...), you think you've had it all, but than the real Traudl Junge gives away a last testimony, looking back on her life with Hitler ... blowing you away even more. I can't remember that I've ever been so quiet after seeing a movie and apparently I wasn't the only one. Really no-one spoke a word during the first minutes after the lights went on again. I don't think many movies have ever touched the audience in such a deep way as this one did.
Because of its historical value and realism, this movie should be seen by everybody and especially by young people at school. Forget those history books for once, this will get through to them at least ten times better. I'm sure that everybody will admit that this movie is a true masterpiece. People who don't know anything about the subject will be able to learn a lot about it and people who already thought they knew it all will still find some new things and will admit that this is exactly the way it must have been 60 years ago. I think there can be only one appropriate score for this movie and that is a full 10/10. Go see it people, NOW!!!