2. Downfall
Downfall is told from the point-of-view of Traudi Junge, Hitler's personal secretary, revealing the last two weeks in the life of both Adolf and his innermost circle. Set almost entirely in his private bunker in Berlin, it starts on the day of Hitler's 56th birthday. Just miles away, Russian forces bear down as the might of the German Reich crumbles to dust. In the relative safety of his fortified retreat, Adolf still believes his forces will summon the necessary resolve to turn the tide of the war around. Generals encamped beside him look to each other with nervous eyes. The next few days fail to justify Hitler's optimism. Vitriolic rage - so vividly directed for years to the rest of the world - now gets applied internally, the finger of blame pointing to the commanders surrounding him. As reality finally sets in, even Adolf has to concede the unthinkable and admit defeat. Once accepted, Hitler and his most loyal companions and their families enter a suicide pact. Quietly, they begin their final preparations... Bruno Ganz delivers an uncanny portrayal of Hitler. There will probably never be a closer, more authentic recreation of what happened in those closing days of the war - but the portrayal of Hitler here also gives us a unique emotional insight into the mind of a madman. In doing so, the film deconstructs the 20th Century's biggest monster, revealing a flawed and broken man. As noted earlier, this kind of reveal usually works to a film's detriment - but here, it exposes one individual, singled out by fate to enable unprecedented evil, a vital cog in a bigger ideological machine.