No monsters, but not my kind

Rating: 9/10 (20 September 2005)

One of the first movies to 'enlighten' us on what happened behind the curtains of the German high command. And to show their 'human' side and to try to portrait how they lived, how fanatic their devotion was to their fuhrer. In a way its refreshing because you feel it shows the truth... and the truth is so painful it took over 50 years before this movie could be made. I think this is one of the best 'anti' war movies ever made. Because it shows the failure of an 'absule' ideology, how following a man or an ideology blindly, can blind people from the Truth. Even when the Fuhrer himself can no longer see clearly.
This movie shows that none of the Nazi top and high command were monsters... Humans are not monsters and never will be. Saying someone, is a monster, tries to dehumanize them, and thus imply that 'normal' human beings would never do such cruel things. This denial is the real big threat, because we all need to remember. That under the 'right' circumstances we could do terrible things, and this movie portraits the 'right' circumstances they were in.
The flip side of the coin is that because the secretary of Hitler: 'Traudl' could see clearly Hitler as a human, she could not believe he could do such monstrous things.
The movie shows also that an absolute ideology leads to absolute measures and actions, and for some of them the ultimate action, to commit suicide. To follow the rules of the ideology is all what matters, and here human decency is not one of them. This means destroying everything and needlessly letting civilians die. Hitler says: 'In a war, there are no civilians', 'We are a weaker people, so by the rules of nature our people will rot away'.
Its becomes clear that children are even more susceptible to absolute values and are even more easily 'programmed', then adults. Seeing 14/12 year old children fight and die for their believes, makes that all too clear.
I really found this movie astonishing, an psychedelic mix of violence, romance, love, madness and cruelty. The reality portrayed is so surrealistic it doesn't need a Hollywood sauce. The acting and special effect are so good you think your're actually there. But that was of course the intention, to let us relive a part of history we would be all too pleased to forget, but never should.