FILM-FORWARD.COMReviews of Recent Independent, Foreign, & Documentary Films in Theaters and DVD/Home Video
BONHOEFFER
Despite its inspiring themes, this straightforward biography of Lutheran
pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who conspired to kill Adolf Hitler, is better
suited for TV than for the big screen. After his beloved older brother is
killed in the Great War, Bonhoeffer is drawn to the
church, believing that through it he could change the world for the better. As both the
Protestant and Catholic Church collude with the Nazi state, Bonhoeffer joins
the conspiracy, which includes his brother-in-law, feeling obliged as a
Christian to help victims and resist Hitler's policies. But Bonhoeffer's
role in the plot is never spelled out. Accompanying the by-the-numbers
narration by actor Klaus Maria Brandauer is an abundant use of family photos
and archival footage, which varies from an eerie scene of a Christmas tree
surrounded by swastikas to generic footage of shots of New York in the '20s,
which are incongruously used during a voice-over concerning Bonhoeffer in
the '30s. Fortunately, contemporary interviews with a niece and nephew,
former students and Bonhoeffer's best friend help liven the documentary's
pedestrian tone. KT
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