Review of Downfall

Like all War films that surround World War II taken from Hitler's side they all often have the knack of showing Hitler on rare, unintended positive side. Der Untergang has this problem. For the person who was slaughtered millions of innocent people, how can we see him doing things such as padding through a young boy's hair or putting a nervous secretary at ease with a joke? Luckily this is sort of kept under control with screenwriter Bernd Eichinger, who basically delivers that idea that even the worst of the Nazis were still human at heart, regardless of their intentions. The more interesting parts of the film is seeing Hitler not just picking out the Jews, but him and his cohorts going from picking out everyone, even to random Berliners who were considered traitors in Hitler's eyes. This film basically does delve in the fact that Hitler was long gone mad in his last final days.

The film as a whole on the other hand..it's well..slow and scattered. You can even tell at times that it was glued together from a multitude of historical sources. Making some sequences long and over-done, allowing it to drag, even if Traudl Junge has an interesting story (even if it was re-stated before in the documentary "Hitler's Secretary".), and the filmmakers seem to lack the drama of what was going on with the specific people which allowed them to get all caught up in what was happening.

Overall Downfall succeeds even if does seem like it could have use some re-organizing, and better sense of pace. It's still well worth a watch.

8 / 10.