Boot, Das

Rating: ****/*****, or 8/10

Chilling, claustrophobic film about a German WW II submarine crew and the difficult duties they had to perform under heavy duress and constant danger of sinking and dying an ignoble, agonizing death, all the while continually contemplating why they fought the way they did for a government many of them viewed with distaste. Lt. Werner (Herbert Grönemeyer) joins an U-Boat crew as a war correspondent, chronicling the life aboard ship under the command of Captain Lehmann-Willenbrock, an explicitly anti-nazi veteran (which makes it all the more easy to identify with him and his crew, though this doesn't prove hard to begin with). Werner records the vessel going through one rough patch after another, the men aboard slowly loosing their mind and morale under the growing pressure (of both the fear for their lives and the water). This is not a film about Nazis, or even German soldiers: it's a film about ordinary men – boys even, considering the young age of many of them – trapped in a tiny space, cramped together for months on end without seeing day light, living through hell as they are bombed on all sides while trying to accomplish nigh impossible missions. It's also a triumph of cinematography, shooting tiny compartments in every possible way to maximum dramatic effect and emotional impact. Available in various versions, being released both as a theatrical film (regular cut running 149 minutes, Director's Cut 209 minutes) and a miniseries for TV (running a whopping 293 minutes). Any version is well worth the watch.

Starring: Jürgen Prochnow, Herbert Grönemeyer, Klaus Wennemann

Directed by Wolfgang Petersen

Germany: Bavaria Film, 1981