Incannerax What a waste of my time!!!

StunnaKrypto Self-important, over-dramatic, uninspired.

Hadrina The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

Myron Clemons A film of deceptively outspoken contemporary relevance, this is cinema at its most alert, alarming and alive.

kellyhighfield-215-363324 I read the novel and loved it, couldn't put it down. I stumbled on the film by accident while flicking channels. I didn't know it had been made and as somebody says the Hollywood suits should be ashamed of themselves for turning down the opportunity to do it justice.Normally I hate films that introduce characters that are not in the original books but the Jean Marsh role as the embittered actress who failed to make it in Hollywood is superb. Jean Marsh is chilling and I've never seen her do better. She justifies her own existence. Just before seeing it I had seen a dramatisation of the Wannsee conference by BBC2 and the facts were fairly fresh for me. The names you hear were real people.The crowd scenes ARE too small but Rutger Hauer is believable as the decent German looking for the truth and though Miranda Richardson comes across as a bit neurotic (as usual) she is plausible.Lets start a campaign for a big budget version.

GusF Rutger Hauer and Miranda Richardson were very good in the lead roles but at the same time I don't think that they had great chemistry which is a letdown. Richardson's accent seemed to fluctuate a bit before settling down about half way through the film. Michael Kitchen was wasted in a small-ish role but he was as good as ever. Jean Marsh's performance, little more than a cameo, was chilling.One major flaw with the movie is that it didn't utilise the very talented actors that it assembled to maximum effect, two other notable examples being Peter Vaughan and John Shrapnel. Plus I had a hard time accepting Hauer as the good guy at first since I'd never seen him play one before. Anyway, it isn't a patch on the book but, all in all, I really enjoyed it.

Armand A hypothetical victory of Nazi regime and Germany as body of Hitler vision. Glory of a powerful political system and U.S.A like the good friend of Berlin. The silence and order. Masks and strange peace. It is an only truth and the Fuhrer is its creator.It is a beautiful film, realistic, cruel and suggestive. But it is not only result of imagination. It is not a possibility or image of alternative history. Many aspects of action was everyday realities in Asian Far East or in East Europe. And the fall of Third Reich was more than a moral victory or an triumph of democracy but, at first, form of revenge against an ambiguous beast.So, the film is interesting for the art to create an atmosphere of dictatorship. The name of leader is only insignificant detail. China of Mao or Ceausescu's Romania, Albania of Enver Hoxha or Niyazov's Turkmenistan are acts of same play. In fact, the triumph of Hitler was not ordinary chimera. Force, fanaticism and madness was elements easy to create and use. And this is the essence of movie. The testimony about crimes is not only a form of protest or protection of real truth but form of survive. The Hauer character is not hero but butcher of ambiguity and deep sleep of conscience.A touching film about an ordinary possibility. An ambiguous danger and an very actual if.

Mark Hale Robert Harris's other novels have made a good transition onto the screen. "Enigma" worked well because of its top-notch cast and careful recreation of WWII England. "Archangel" was an above-average TV movie because of its compelling subject matter. "Fatherland" fell flat because it was poorly cast and made on a microscopic budget. Despite their pedigree and talent, many of the cast are clearly uncomfortable in their roles. Rutger Hauer and Michael Kitchen should have swapped scripts and Miranda Richardson should have called for a taxi. She's a very good actor but completely fails to convince as an American journalist who dresses like a 60-year-old whore.The plot is edited down to its bare bones and loses a lot of its impact in the process of being filleted. The screenplay spends far too long looking behind the shiny Nazi facade, creating an expectation of bad things about to happen far too early in its running time. Bled of all its suspense, "Fatherland" limps toward a predictable climax, robbing the story of any historical relevance or impact.There are strong similarities between "Fatherland" and "Archangel", with their stories of past events influencing the present and old ghosts that refuse to lie still, but "Fatherland" has "EPIC" stamped all over it. A story about an enduring Nazi Europe in the 1960s can't be told against a backdrop of dodgy mattes with approximately 30 extras for the crowd scenes. If ever a movie deserved to be recast and remade for substantially more than 50 quid, "Fatherland" is that movie. The Hollywood Suits should hang their heads in shame for not recognising a fantastic story and giving it to someone like Steven Spielberg.