The Captain - l'usurpateur

The film revolves around authority, the trust we tend to have towards a person we endow with authority, official ranks, hierarchy, "Kameradschaft", the sense of belonging to a group, and (for me at least), egoism in general. It is also quite brutal and sadistic. The story itself, with the most improbable twists, is taken from a real life story at the end of the war. It is rare in war films to have the perspective of the criminal. We do not sympathise with him, but rather he impersonates the beast in every one of us. Another merit of the film is quite natural: German actors can of course impersonate German soldiers better than for example US ones, it also gives a realistic touch to the film as opposed to US war movies featuring evil nazis. The message of the film was for me clear and delivered with a great impression - I will not write it here as it would be flat in my words.

You can compare this WWO2 movie with the style of Dunkirk. That means that the movie is not for everyone, but if you can appreciate this kind of movies, it's magnificent. The movie doesn't want to be a hollywood blazing brainless action movie, but wants to portrait the germans on an individual level. Like @barta-46978 says, the movie is about authority and gives yourself an insight in what it must have been at the time, and even how you would react in the given circumstances. The movie is explicit and kind of shocking. It really intrigued me, we need more movies like this.

Well maybe "knew it" would be better ... but that would not be as close to the song as I had in mind. Just a little nugget/hint/joke I like to make with my summary lines. Not that this is a comedy - most German movies are either known as romantic comedies/dramas or have the second world war as a topic - this obviously being the latter.

This has an intersting twist with a character assuming a position and power grab, that will run throughout the movie. War is not a game and what it does with people (especially when they get into a position of power) is shown here very vividly. Very well played and acted (mostly in black and white nonetheless). If you don't have issues with the subject matter and the symbols shown, the movie might be something you want to watch. Interesting take to say the least.

I'd like to make it very clear that I seldom rate any film a 10. IMDB is awash with 10's that have little originality and are complete nonsense ratings. 10 should ALWAYS be reserved for films which are unique and outstanding. Now I know that is rather a vague definition but for me, at the end of the day a '10' has got to be reserved in order to maintain some modicum of rating integrity.

This film took me on a quite unexpected journey; From an apparantly innocent private just trying to etch out some degree of respite and dignity from the chaos of war, to a shakespearean like or perhaps more fittingly Conrad-like descent into the depths of desperation, depravity and moral absence. The film has so many layers and aspects of what human beings are capable of under extreme conditions; The man who chooses to take his own life, immediately juxtaposed by his friend who proceeds to take the lives of others in the hope of extending his own until the next appalling moral dilemma is presented. (too many to go into here). There is so much I could say about this film but will just end on one particularly high impact scene that at least for me, represented both the darkness of nature, and that of human nature: Towards the end of the film, the protagonist comes across skeletal remains in a forest. One particular artistic cinematic shot renders the remains in such a way that they appear to have oozed out, or been thrown out, by the dark mouth of the forest, the forest clearly being a metaphor for the dark power of nature that has no moral measure; it just, is.

It's beautifully lit and shot movie. Greatly edited. Boldly directed. Yet somehow empty. Brings to my mind great "Ravenous" by Katherine Bigelow - the same, bit weird, grotesque, satirical tone of the story, the same kind of director's interest in evil within any of us. But - from staging and casting, trough costumes, props, locations, acting, cinematography, to editing, and the role of music and color - "The Captain" is much much much better, more consistent and more determined in terms of aesthetics than Bigelow's vision. And, in the same time, much much much more misleading in terms of its identity. You really can't tell WHAT kind of movie this is exactly - a bit thriller, a bit war cinema, a bit western, a bit drama, a bit dark comedy, a bit fairy-tale, a bit noir, even a bit horror and poetry.... It's refreshing to see WWII topic being treated with such a nonchalant attitude (Tarantino does not count - he is just a separate ligue of his own, and his aims with "Glorious Bestards" are just completely different in my opinion), but on the other hand "The Captain" seems bit immature, bit comic-like, bit 'form-over-substance' kind of thing. But... on the other hand again - the grotesque immaturity of depiction corresponds with grotesque immaturity of the very young main character who's real-life doings were the core of the story. On the other hand though... end credits add another layer of interpretation to the mix. And so on, and so on.

Very thought provoking movie - if you like to think about cinema's language and purpose, or the reasons behind every evil (or even about a role of ego in those two areas respectively). Not so much if you want to explore REAL dilemmas and REAL tragedies of WWII - here, those are SURREAL rather.

Summing up - definitely worth watching, as a somehow different approach to an already very well covered subject.