Intelligent, Truthful, Honest, and so German

Rating: 10/10 (31 August 2005)

The best German film I ever saw, and, frankly, one I never expected to see: a fair and true German look at that battle. This movie, and "The Enemy at the Gates", like one dark twin and one bright, show the battle of Stalingrad rather truthfully. Both stress the aristocratic social aspect of being a German officer then. I know for a fact that this aspect did exist. Some of the things you see and hear in this film, you never would, in a West made or Russian made film about the same event. Nor would they occur to you, at all, if you are not German and close to the living memories of that war. The way they received, or were denied, medals, for instance. O Tannenbaum, o Tannenbaum.