Jacob the Liar

49th Academy Awards: Best Foreign Film Nominee
Jacob the Liar (Jakob der Lügner)
1976
Germany (East)
Color
Directed by Frank Beyer

Plot: A Jewish ghetto in the east of Europe, 1944. By coincidence, Jakob Heym eavesdrops on a German radio broadcast announcing the Soviet Army is making slow by steady progress towards central Europe. In order to keep his companion in misfortune, Mischa, from risking his life for a few potatoes, he tells him what he heard and announces that he is in possession of a radio - in the ghetto a crime punishable by death. It doesn't take long for word of Jakob's secret to spread. Suddenly, there is new hope and something to live for and so Jakob finds himself in the uncomforting position of having to come up with more and more stories.

Theme: Comedy, Crime, Drama

Links: imdb | Wikipedia

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The Tin Drum

52th Academy Awards: Best Foreign Film Winner
The Tin Drum (Die Blechtrommel)
1979
Germany (West)
Color
Directed by Volker Schlöndorff

Plot: Danzig in the 1920s/1930s. Oskar Matzerath, son of a local dealer, is 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. However, (almost) nobody listens to him, so the catastrophe goes on...

Theme: Drama, War

Links: imdb | Wikipedia

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The White Ribbon

82nd Academy Awards: Best Foreign Film Nominee
The White Ribbon (Das weiße Band)
2009
Germany
B&W
Directed by Michael Haneke

Plot: Strange events happen in a small village in the north of Germany during the years just before World War I, which seem to be ritual punishment. The abused and suppressed children of the villagers seem to be at the heart of this mystery.

Theme: War, WWI

Links: imdb | Wikipedia | Song Classic

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The Baader Meinhof Complex

81st Academy Awards: Best Foreign Film Nominee
The Baader Meinhof Complex (Der Baader Meinhof Komplex)
2008
Germany
Color
Directed by Uli Edel

Plot: Germany in the 1970s: Murderous bomb attacks, the threat of terrorism and the fear of the enemy inside are rocking the very foundations of the yet fragile German democracy. The radicalised children of the Nazi generation lead by Andreas Baader, Ulrike Meinhof and Gudrun Ensslin are fighting a violent war against what they perceive as the new face of fascism: American imperialism supported by the German establishment, many of whom have a Nazi past. Their aim is to create a more human society but by employing inhuman means they not only spread terror and bloodshed, they also lose their own humanity. The man who understands them is also their hunter: the head of the German police force Horst Herold. And while he succeeds in his relentless pursuit of the young terrorists, he knows he's only dealing with the tip of the iceberg. (Written by Constantin Film)

Theme: Nazi

Links: imdb | Wikipedia | Official Website (English)

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The Lives Of Others

79th Academy Awards: Best Foreign Film Winner
The Lives Of Others (Das Leben der Anderen)
2006
Germany
Color
Directed by Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck

Plot: In 1984 East Berlin, an agent of the secret police, conducting surveillance on a writer and his lover, finds himself becoming increasingly absorbed by their lives.

Theme: Communist, Spy

Links: imdb | Wikipedia | Official Website

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Sophie Scholl – The Final Days

78th Academy Awards: Best Foreign Film Nominee
Sophie Scholl – The Final Days (Die letzten Tage)
2005
Germany
Color
Directed by Marc Rothemund

Plot: A dramatization of the final days of Sophie Scholl, one of the most famous members of the German World War II anti-Nazi resistance movement, The White Rose.

Theme: WWII, Nazi

Links: imdb | Wikipedia | Official Website (English)

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Downfall

77th Academy Awards: Best Foreign Film Nominee
Downfall (Der Untergang)
2004
Germany
Color
Directed by Oliver Hirschbiegel

Plot: Traudl Junge, the final secretary for Adolf Hitler, tells of the Nazi dictator's final days in his Berlin bunker at the end of WWII.

Theme: WWII, Nazi

Links: imdb | Wikipedia | Official Website

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Nowhere In Africa

75th Academy Awards: Best Foreign Film Winner
Nowhere In Africa (Nirgendwo in Afrika)
2002
Germany
Color
Directed by Caroline Link

Plot: A German Jewish refugee family moves to and adjusts to a farm life in 1930's Kenya.

Theme: WWII, Nazi

Links: imdb | Wikipedia

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