Rien que la vérité

This is a disturbing movie, a courtroom drama in which a man claiming to be Josef Mengele voluntarily returns to Germany for trial. He enlists an unwilling lawyer to defend him in a court of law. The lawyer must defend the indefensible, an act he finds personally repugnant but accepts because of a need to understand the holocaust and what let it happen. The answer seems to be that unspeakable evil lurks closer than one might comfortably imagine.

This film is absolutely wonderful. Not in the way that it makes you feel good, oh no! It seduces you to try to understand the deeds of one of the most famous and feared Nazis ever: Dr. Josef Mengele. It leads you to the point where you have to declare where your own point of view is located without offering the easy way out...

Nichts als die Wahrheit is a very entertaining thriller that I caught on TFO. Dr. Mengele, the evil doctor of Auschwitz, did not die in 1979 but instead returns to Germany of his own free will to face trial for his crimes. The man he chooses as his lawyer is not sure he wants to defend such a brutal man, but says that every man deserves a fair trial. There are the usual types of people on one side or another: neo-Nazis, leftwingers, media people. It gets rough--a man is blown up by a car bomb. The courtroom scenes are usually effective; they show us how Mengele's trial would have been an embarrassment for many people in the new Germany had it actually taken place.

One actor stands out: Gotz George, who I have never seen before, is terrific and terrifying as Mengele. He uses a soft, breathy voice to sinister effect as he plays cat and mouse with everybody, but especially with Rohm, his lawyer. George is made up to look a little like one of the Hellraiser demons.

When I saw AFTER THE TRUTH I was absolutely spellbound. Such a monstrous, though in fact, quite simple idea could actually be turned into a film? In Germany? Never! The fact stands that this is a brave and well crafted study of a man's choice between professional opportunity and his personal ethics. Forced to defend The Angel Of Death - Dr. Josef Mengele - his personal life is, understandably, completely turned upside down. The script by Johannes W. Betz manages to alternate convincingly between scenes portraying his inner turmoil and the fascinating encounters with Dr. Mengele. Götz George as Mengele is excellent and it is largely through his brilliant performance that the story is so fascinating and believable. The ending of the film felt a bit like a copout to me but the clever editing and the accomplished direction by Roland Suso Richter never falter. After living in fear that the German cinema was dead and buried, there appears to be new blood to bring it back to life.

The story of Nazi collaborators being brought to justice would not seem interesting anymore in these days, even with the emergence of extreme Nationalistic tendencies in several places out of Germany, but Roland Suso Richter made an intelligent and moving drama, based on a fantasy. Suppose that "The Angel of Death of Auschwitz", Dr. Josef Mengele (who never faced German justice and died in Brazil) had come back to Berlin, selected a bright young lawyer (Peter Rohm) for his defense, and asked to be judged to set the facts straight, or to put it in his words, "to let the Truth be known". The lawyer's only strategy is to interpret Mengele's actions under the medical ethics of his time, and in a way he succeeds to prove that Mengele was just acting according to the common notion in Nazi Germany, that doctors could and should dispense of lives that weren't worth-living. But there's more to it. Although the script (by Johannes W. Betz and Christopher and Kathleen Riley) makes a fine tapestry of past and present (and includes a disturbing final speech by Mengele) and the camera-work by Martin Lager is first rate, director Richter does not incurs in flashy style. His mise-en-scene is elegant and confident, immensely helped by the excellent performances by Götz George as Mengele and Kai Wiesinger as Rohm.