Product Description In the German countryside during the waning weeks of WWII, army deserter Willi Herold (Max Hubacher) was just looking for warm clothing when he came upon an abandoned staff car containing a captain's uniform and orders. Assuming the officer's identity, he found everyone he encountered unquestioningly buying in... including those at the prison camp where he ordered fellow soldiers executed for cowardice. Fact-based, often darkly comic tale co-stars Milan Peschel. 118 min. Widescreen; Soundtrack: German; Subtitles: English. In German with English subtitles. Review NYT Critic's Pick Astonishing. A harrowing World War II psychodrama. --Jeannette Catsoulis, The New York TimesHollywood will be hard-pressed to come up with a more horrifying film this year than writer-director Robert Schwentke's The Captain ... A brave and uncompromising indictment of human nature, Teutonic or otherwise … Absurdist burlesque … Hardly the kind of penitent, play-it-safe war movie we so often get from Germany: grim, TV-funded costume dramas that get caught up in all the period-correct pageantry while respectfully distancing themselves from the past. Few and far between are the movies...that actually implicate modern viewers in the evil, which is precisely what makes The Captain; such a remarkable film. --Peter DeBruge, VarietyChilling and yet, at times, almost farcical...Unnerving and surreal...A psychological exploration of fascism's roots in the cowardly human heart...Max Hubacher's performance is a masterful physical feat. --April Wolfe, The Village Voice
A**B
Scary good
Throughout the movie kept thinking "hard to believe this really happened". Despite how loosely or closely the movie depicted real events, even if only remotely close to the true story is chilling and upsetting. It is mind blowing that these people were so easily led by this fake captain to include coldly killing other human beings. It is a really well done movie.
M**G
Very Good & Shocking
Watching a man become his oppressors. Very Machiavellian, and horrifying how sadistic an apparently benign Soldier can become.
A**A
Why glorifying an obviously mentally ill individual, a WWII criminal?
Why glorifying an obviously mentally ill individual, responsible for killing over 200 people just before the end of the war?I am no spring chicken by any means and had seen many WWII movies (produced in the last 50 plus years in the West & the East as well, many more descriptive in unpleasant detail, but they had a reason to show the new generation never to repeat what happened in WWII. The movie was extremely well done cinematografically, with mediocre acting; but great camera and tension. But the whole movie's point was to immortalize this obviously mentally deranged human being (I am on purpose not repeating his name here) and any such person today around the globe where weapons are accessible can try to do a copycat (obviously not on such scale), but in my humble opinion his actions did not need to be put into a movie, which does not even show the punishment he deserved and got a year later in 1946. If I had looked up Wikipedia with his name, I would saved myself to watch WWII atrocities on a TV screen for 118 minutes ( I do not mind doing so, if a film has a moral value & codex ), which this one is lacking complpletely and should never had been produced.
J**L
Excellent movie
A superbly directed movie in black and white with solid acting and a terrific script. During the last days of WWII a soldier in Germany who’s AWOL assumes the persona of a dead German captain and falls under the spell of the uniform becoming the very thing he was fleeing from. Be sure to watch this movie to the very end. Four stars !
S**S
An Intriguing Movie!
The true story of a German soldier who would have been shot for desertion escapes, and becomes that from which he tried to escape! Truly a bazaar and intriguing movie. Mostly filmed in black and white, to give it an authentic look.
A**R
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100%
A**R
Zone 2. I missed that.
Try not to buy Zone 2 dvd's. Fortunately have an all zone player.Not that impressed with the content. Land of Mine, much better.
R**Y
ww2
unique story, that actually happened, I'm sure much more is to tell
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