Year: 2004
Director: Oliver Hirschbiegel
So I’m only a decade or so late to this particular party, but bloody hell this is good. I’ve had years of this Downfall meme, and found them all to be pretty amusing to one degree or another, but seeing the whole movie on SBS at last was a complete blast. I haven’t felt that claustrophobic and tense in yonks. Jeez it’s long though. It was amazing that they managed to make so much happen in what (in hindsight) must have been a very limited set of locations. Just adding to sense of claustrophobia and encroaching forces.
Bruno Ganz is terrifically unhinged, everyone else is a wildly varying shade of mental, and Alexandra Maria Lara is fabulous. Doing very little but expressing heaps as the witness to the chaos.
Might appeal to people who enjoyed:
Buggered if I know. Can’t think of anything even remotely close. Battleship Potemkin perhaps ?
If you haven’t seen them I can also recommend The Lives Of Others and Sophie Scholl. Downfall is indeed brilliant.
The Lives Of Others is the shit. Another astonishing central performance, too. Not quite as good, but another decent film from the noughties set during the war is The Counterfeiters.
I find it extraordinary that you saw Bruno Ganz having the piss taken out of him so many times before you got to see the real thing – it must have been at least a slight handicap to your appreciation of his performance. I know when you’re immersed in the film you’re immersed in the film, but even so..?
You’re right, it was a handicap. But given the atmosphere and the run up to that particular scene, then seeing it in context with the real sub-titles, there was no possibility of sniggering from me.
SBS? When did they screen it?
Last night (Sat 18th Apr) . I posted this pretty much straight after I was so impressed.
These we have loved….
If you let it go onto the next video there’s an interview with Bruno Ganz which is even funnier….. Great man. AND he was in Nosferatu.
I enjoyed that.
It was a pleasant diversion as my missus would say.
Have an up arrow.
’nuff said from me
I watched this when it came out at the tiny cinema they have by the beach at Broadstairs. I was there for a couple of days with the mrs and nipper and stole off to see it. There … 3 of us in the cinema which was vey quaint and like something from the 1940s anyway which only added to the ambience. Absolutely great film.
I had an odd German flatmate around 10 years ago, here in Dublin. He was ex-military and kept strange hours e.g. in bed before sundown, and he never watched TV. Anyway I came home one evening and he was sat in front of the TV watching Downfall. Having commented that it was unusual that he was watching anything on TV, I asked what he made of Downfall. After much deliberation he offered “It’s a very good film but it only shows the negative side of the Nazis.” I could never figure whether he was serious or not.
Extrordinary film, though left me shredded and had to go for a long walk to get over the scene of Mrs Goebbels and the children. It took me a while to get that scene out of my head. The only bum note is the at the end, the secretary walking past Russian soldiers as if she were invisible. Not sure that would have happened as depicted.
You’re right on the Goebbels children thing, that was harrowing.
As for the secretary and her escape, the credits talk of the screenplay being based on a couple of history books including one by the secretary. She survived the war and they include an interview with her right at the end of the movie too, so I assume that her escape is going to be reasonably close to her reality – strange things happen in war, especially things we’d find unbelievable. Or it could have been a complete fabrication and poetic license. Who knows.
Overall though, no idea how close to reality they claim the movie to be.
The documentary Blind Spot: Hitler’s Secretary features a long form interview with Traudl Junge shortly before she died in the 2000’s. She also is a key interviewee in the Battle For Berlin episode of The World At War. She was playing with the Goebbels children when Hitler shot himself and one of the boys exclaimed “Bullseye!”.
As a unique witness to history it’s a perfect companion to Downfall
I’ve only seen it within the last year and, like you Harold, had ready seen loads of the memes. I agree with the comments about Frau Goebbels. But what I found really distracting was that the secretary looked like David Mitchell* in drag. Sorry. Fantastic film though. Have the Lives of Others on Blu Ray but have yet to sit and watch it.
*the comedy actor David Mitchell, not the author.
On the theme of German history, I also highly recommend “The Reader” starring Kate Winslet as a troubled bus conductor who has a love affair with a teenager after the war. I won’t spoil the movie by revealing her character and the plot line, except to say it touches on how the Germans addressed their Nazi guilt complex. It’s a cracking piece of acting from Winslet. and indeed from Ralph Fiennes who plays the boy in later life. Brilliant screenplay adapted from a novel.