German Films: Feature Films

Grateful for a respite from his imploding marriage, Hamburg newspaperman Georg arrives in civil war torn Beirut to chronicle the bloody Lebanese war. Inside a shell-pitted hotel, Georg and colleague Hoffman, join a cynical international coterie of competitive fellow journalists. Outside, they take their lives in their own hands, dodging bullets and conducting interviews that are always just a trigger pull away from becoming executions.

A chemist who is neutral in the war allows poison to be produced in his factory that is being used in the Nazi concentration camps to kill the masses.

The film follows the daring patrol of the U-96, one of the famed German U-boats known as the "gray wolves." The crew is graphically portrayed in a life-and-death struggle, challenging the British Navy at every turn.

Werner Fassbindera's allegorical story of post-war Germany revolves around a young woman as she strives for material wealth while ignoring human values.

The film takes you into Hitler's bunker, in 1945, during the brutal and harrowing last days of the Third Reich. Seen through the eyes of Hitler's infamous secretary Gertraud (Traudl) Junge, optimism crumbles into grim realization and terror as it becomes clear that Germany's defeat is inevitable. As the Russian army circles the city, the dimly lit halls of the underground refuge become an execution chamber for the Fuhrer and his closest advisors.

This is the true story of a Jewish teenager who survived World War II by living as a Nazi for 7 years and through 3 countries.

The film tells the story of a man obsessed with a dream to build his own personal opera house in a remote Peruvian town.

Alex's proud, socialist mother falls into a coma for eight months. When she wakes, her heart is weak, so Alex has to keep the secret that the Berlin Wall has fallen and capitalism has triumphed. What beings as a little white lie turns into a major scam.

This is a fictional chronicle of life in Germany, from 1919 to 1982, as reflected in the fluctuating fortunes of the members of one family, initially peasant-farmers, in the fictitious village of Schachbach in the Rhineland. It is an extraordinary succession of mostly ordinary events and characters -- history seen from ground level -- vividly acted by a huge cast of both professional and nonprofessional actors.

Le Tour de France is the toughest bicycle race of all. This film shows the torture and the pain, the fear and the courage of the riders on the Tour. It also showcases the supporting casts of managers, masseurs, fans, and more. The film may be about the French bicycle race but it is from a German point of view in German with subtitles.

Set in the pre-industrial past, the story tells of a German village that loses the secret of making its unique Ruby glass. The townspeople turn to madness, murder, and magic in a desperate effort to recover the pure ingredient they have lost. During the filming, Werner Herzog, the director, hypnotized his actors in order to help convey the atmosphere of hallucination, prophecy and the visionary.

An actor of the Art Theatre Company of Hamburg, who subordinates everything to his success, befriends a principal figure in the Nazi power machinery and is drawn into the poisonous circle of evil from which he can no longer escape.

This class film tells the story of a 21st century city run by a "super trustee" and his collaborators who live in a paradise-like garden. Workers are totally enslaved by machines and condemned to live underground. In the midst of this misery, a young woman, Maria, arises and attempts to inspire the workers to throw off their oppressors.

Martha is the chef who fusses and obsesses over each dish before it leaves the kitchen. The demands of her job and her natural shyness keep her from meeting new people. When her sister suddenly dies, Martha adopts Lina, her eight-year-old niece, completely changing both lives. Martha gets unexpected help from Mario, Martha's hunky new sous chef, who is not only a whiz on the chopping block but knows sundry magic tricks and jokes to keep Lina's spirits afloat. Just as Martha starts to grow attached to the girl, Lina's erratic father shows up demanding that he take her back to Italy with him.

Critically acclaimed, this is the award winning true tale of a Jewish family who flee the Nazi regime in 1938 and learns to cope with their new life, and each other, on a remote farm in Kenya.

After the death of her father, Hannah becomes concerned with the strange behavior of her mother. As her mother's troubled childhood is revealed, Hannah realizes how little she ever knew.

This thrilling post-MTV, roller-coaster ride is about two star-crossed lovers who have only minutes to change the course of their lives. Time is running out: Lola has just received a frantic call from her boyfriend Manni, who�?�s accidentally lost a small fortune he was to deliver to his mobster boss. If they cannot find a way to replace the money within twenty minutes, Manni will surely suffer severe consequences.

The film depicts the last six days (February 17-22, 1943) in the life of Sophie Scholl from her own perspective: that of a courageous and vibrant young woman who is willing to face death for her belief in her ideals and those of the White Rose, an underground resistance movement to which she belongs. Through their resistance and protest against the Nazi regime, Sophie and her fellow members of the White Rose become synonymous with civil courage and a peaceful struggle against the rule of violence and oppression.

This film features the bloodiest battle in the history of warfare - the legendary battle of Stalingrad.

Based on the book by Gunter Grass of the same name, the film chronicles Danzig in the 1920s/1930s and the life and times of Oskar Matzerath the son of a local dealer, a most unusual boy. Equipped with full intellect right from his birth, he decides at his third birthday not to grow up as he sees the crazy world around him at the eve of World War II. So he refuses the society and his tin drum symbolizes his protest against the middle-class mentality of his family and neighborhood, which stand for all passive people in Nazi Germany at that time.

This film is a subtle, disturbing version of the vampire legend in which a young man attempts to find and kill a vampire that has assumed the form of an old woman.

This film depicts the long, turbulent, and productive life of Leni Riefenstahl, former dancer and filmmaker to Hitler, whose Triumph des Willens and Olympia were prime Nazi propaganda documents. In disrepute after World War II, Riefenstahl turned to anthropological filmmaking and underwater cinematography.