Which one? -That tall one.
You two, go get that kid.
What do they want, Erich?
Take a good look at him.
That's him.
It's this one.
Based on a novel by Hermann Kant:
Script by:
Starring:
Directed by:
Last name?
Niebuhr.
N-i-e-b-u-h-r.
First name?
Mark.
Birthdate?
September 2nd, 1926.
Where?
Marne, in southern Dithmarschen.
Marne?
Yes, Marne.
Address?
Prielweg 4.
Occupation?
Printer.
11:40 AM.
Hurry up.
They ask that you
write down your biography.
Hurry up.
Looks good.
Hurry up.
Disinfection.
Stop.
Get in!
Heil Hitler!
Bring him here.
Translate!
We're happy to welcome a SS member.
I am not from the SS.
Get on your knees, please.
On your knees.
We've waited six years for this.
We are standing
and the SS is kneeling.
I wasn't in the SS.
I really wasn't - not SS.
Strip him.
He wants that you stay on your knees.
Nothing will happen to you here.
The authorities still need you.
Why are Poles here?
And why shouldn't they be?
We've got thieves, looters, burglars
constables, administrators, and detectives.
We are a normal nation.
But they didn't teach you that.
You were supposed to just kill us.
Right?
You need to report every day.
And this is how you'll have to do it.
I report that the cell No.40
is occupied by one person. All are present.
You'll have to do it in Polish.
At night, remember to add a "good night."
Also, you need to be visible at all times.
Even if you're just sitting there.
In that case, just wave to the guard.
When he checks on you.
Heavens! This will take a while.
Well, you've got plenty of time.
What is your name anyway?
Mark Niebuhr.
I'll call you Marek.
My name is Eugeniusz.
I lived in Vienna for a long time.
Mr.Eugeniusz ..
They won't tell me why I'm here.
They're waiting for you to tell them.
They are giving you a special treatment.
You've got your own cell.
Intensive lice treatment.
I didn't have lice. - TTT.
An American invention. Be grateful.
They sent loads of that powder to Poland.
And now we believe
the Americans will arrive soon, too.
They think I'm someone else.
I don't think so, Mr. Marek.
Stop!
Coat off.
Pants off.
Spread the cabbage and the salt.
March around!
You can sing "Deutschland, Deutschland über alles."
Spread it all around.
March!
It's full!
Hand me the shovel.
Did you write this?
Yes.
Let's start over.
Who are you?
Mark Niebuhr.
How can I know?
Where are you from?
From Marne.
How can I know?
You can write there.
When were you in Lublin?
I wasn't in Lublin.
How can I know?
There is Erich Seifert from Pirna.
I was with him last at the train station.
When was he in Lublin?
How long have you been in Poland?
Since January 3rd, 1945.
How do you know?
That's my mother's birthday.
Please ...
What did I do?
Bon appétit.
Standing like a SS puppet.
Not SS, I am army.
The herring was good? - Yes, it was.
Good night, Mr.Director!
Good night, Mr.Director.
Silent Night in German
Get up there!
Come on!
Pull.
Hey, German!
Come down!
Leave him alone.
Don't take it personally, Marek.
Tell the truth
and I'll treat you to a big meal.
Who are you?
Mark Niebuhr.
When were you in Lublin?
I wasn't in Lublin.
Tell the truth.
That's the truth.
You are just making it harder for yourself.
By hoping we won't find out.
But we've got you.
And we've got time.
Mr.Eugeniusz, what happened in Lublin?
What do you mean?
What happened there?
We hope ..
you fall down one day.
Then your case would be over.
But, isn't it peace now?
If you fall down
all that won't matter.
What did you do?
Why are you here?
I ...
I'm a pickup artist.
According to the accusation.
Hey, you!
It's fractured.
I'm not touching that.
You'll have to wait for the doctor.
Are you an eccentric?
Isn't it enough if they break your neck.
Why break the arm, too?
There is no beauty in prison.
We need builders.
And you break your arm.
A true eccentric!
Turn around!
Hey, German!
Hey, you eccentric!
Arent' you allowed to look?
Look.
Go on, ladies.
He's a murderer, my dear ladies.
A murderer from the SS.
Let's go.
Hurry.
Officer ...
I have something to say.
I am not a murderer.
I wasn't in Lublin.
I am Mark Niebuhr.
I'm telling the truth.
You can check.
You can ask people who know me.
Attention!
The cell leader reports
occupancy of 21, all are present.
Welcome, compatriot.
I am General Eisenstick.
Please give us a proper introduction.
Grenadier Mark Niebuhr, Battalion 164, reporting for duty.
Thank you.
Get settled in, grenadier.
I welcome you heartily.
A compatriot from Warsaw.
Soldier.
You are in good company here.
Unfortunatley, it's only men.
Come here, kid.
Sit down.
Did the Poles break your arm?
No, it was my fault.
Why do you still keep the coat?
It's not my coat.
How did it happen?
On the job.
Where did you work?
Just outside the prison.
How long have you been here?
Four months.
What for?
I don't know.
Sure.
Sorgemehl.
Wrong.
Major Ludenbroich.
Wrong.
Müller.
Wrong.
Rotlauf.
Wrong.
The gardener.
Correct.
Guessed at number seven.
You come in fourth place.
Sleep well on your first night here.
This is a good spot.
No one will step on you.
Can I ask you something?
Go ahead, kid.
Where are you from?
Holland.
How did you end up here?
Kid ..
Good question.
I came here as a gardener.
I specialize in tulips.
Where?
In Poland?
I'll explain it
some other time.
Mind if I ask something else?
Not at all.
Does everyone know why they are here?
It depends.
Some had been told.
And some already knew.
Now be quiet.
Shut up, cop!
Who's that?
A Gestapo officer.
You know that?
Sure.
They caught him with his personal file.
My name is Mark Niebuhr.
That's my real name.
I am Jan Beveren.
Call me Jan.
Listen, Jan.
I couldn't talk to anyone in a while.
They're calling me a murderer.
Murderer?
That's not very nice.
They claim I was in Lublin.
But I've never been there.
I don't know what they want from me.
Kid,
what you say sounds convincing.
Unfortunatley, I was captured in a place called
Auschwitz.
If you come from there
the Poles want to see you dead.
How much longer, you two?
Shut up, cop!
Attention!
This you can do with one arm.
Why me?
Because I tell you.
The Poles are calling him a murderer.
From Lublin.
Give me the broom.
You are supposed to be a murderer from Lublin?
Yes.
Forget that they're calling you a murderer.
Tell us what you really did.
Say only what you want to say.
I can tell you everything.
Go ahead.
What exactly?
Where did you fight?
East of Poznan.
That's where the Russian captured me.
On January 27th. - And before that?
In Szczecin, for training.
The Russians handed us over to the Poles.
We moved between different camps. But that didn't seem unusal.
During the transit in Warsaw
A woman approached us at the train station.
I'd never seen her before.
She pointed at me.
That's all?
Yes.
I've been here since then.
I was in the army, not in the SS.
Let the Poles separate those.
Jan, can I ask you something else?
Ask.
What was in Auschwitz?
Why are you asking?
Camps have always existed.
They are a British invention from the Boer War.
Is it true what the Poles are saying? - I wouldn't believe them.
I was in charge of tulips. Entire alleys of tulips.
This is when they start to blossom.
If they are still there.
You wern't in the army very long.
Half a year.
And before?
Did you have a job?
I am a printer. - Very good.
I am a gasman.
I wasn't in the war.
Because of my leg.
Do you have someone at home?
A woman?
No, I don't.
I believe you.
I'm the only one who believes you.
But why are you here - in this cell?
And where did you get the coat from?
I got it from the guardsman.
In my previous cell.
Why?
I was freezing.
We were freezing, too.
Tell me why you're here?
And why are you here, man?
Mr., for you
and Hauptsturmführer.
I saw a guy before
suffocate under his heavy coat.
And the Poles didn't give a damn.
I'm not talking to you anymore.
Sorry, it's an order.
Gentlemen, please ..
Don't lose the military demeanor.
It was an order.
I issue orders here.
Bullshit.
I won't accept that attitude.
I reprimand you.
You are a soldier, too.
And ought to show discipline in these circumstances.
Attention!
Form a line!
Stop!
You!
Not you!
You.
You are the cell leader.
Not you.
Not!
You.
Gentlemen, you are dismissed.
The Poles know no limits.
First step.
The new cell leader will sleep
next to the former cell leader.
Good night.
I'm Lt. Müller.
Execution of hostages.
Attention!
Stop!
Come here.
The idiot speaks Polish.
I issue an order.
From today onward
we'll take turns sweeping the cell.
We will not take orders from any SS murderer.
Attention.
Where is the broom?
You.
Not you.
You are the cell leader.
Sweep.
Sweep!
General ..
General Eisenstick.
Give me the broom.
They can't humiliate me, my dear Lundenbroich.
Listen up.
It's obvious that they are trying to set us against one another.
They want to instigate chaos and hatred.
In response, we need to organize
around the cell leader.
Even if it's him.
He's obviously
coerced into this.
What a bunch of bullshit.
Now, let's find out
whose name starts with A?
With B?
Beveren.
The gardener.
Please, Beveren.
Wrong.
Where were you in Lublin?
I wasn't there.
You can tell me. I was there, too.
I've meant to ask you ..
about my case.
I'm constantly mulling over it.
I don't belong here either.
My case isn't at all simple.
"Acting without authority."
I'm a simple man.
I worked hard to be a gasman.
I read the meters.
A trustworthy job in wartime.
Gas usage was rationed.
On occassions,
with lonely war widows, mostly
I'd be lenient
And they'd be "welcoming."
I'm a jovial and simple fellow.
And in that respect not very Catholic.
During one of my visits
I found a woman together with a Pole.
I knew what they were doing.
Honestly,
I've always looked the other way.
According to the law, however
the Pole couldn't do that.
Nor could the woman.
I wanted to take care of it the normal way, but the Pole
goes crazy.
Starts yelling, smashing stuff.
Tries to attack me.
Meanwhile, the neighbors come out.
They can prove it.
They helped me throw him out of the window.
That's considered "acting without authority."
I guess.
He would've been killed either way.
But I wasn't supposed to take the law into my own hands.
Right?
Maybe you have some legal advice
that would help me, please.
Mitigating circumstances, maybe?
Some sort of legitimacy for what I'd done.
And you didn't go to prison for this?
The woman didn't see it that way.
She didn't care that I'd saved her from being raped.
I was in prison.
During the investigation.
Until the British arrived.
And then the bitch
reported me to a Polish commission.
I've got six children at home waiting for me.
You acted without order.
No one could've issued an order.
There lies the difference.
I don't deny executing hostages, but only on orders.
What are hostages?
Are you kidding?
I really don't know.
Hostages ..
are those removed from the occupied areas for security reasons.
It's always been part of rules of engagement.
Grenadier.
And it's ok to execute them?
Yes, taking hostages
assumes some sort of retaliation.
Even if they are innocent?
Yes, that's the protocol.
Whose protocol?
Who cares.
As soldiers, we don't make laws, we protect them, we act lawfully.
That's why the Poles
are treating us unlawfully.
My own compatriots have turned me over - how is that lawful?
If you ask me, it isn't.
Do you understand now?
I don't know.
I never participated in it.
Wait a second.
Did you shoot in this war?
Once.
One shot?
All day long.
Did you hit the target?
A tank.
With a grenade.
Well done. You must've killed at least four men.
Two escaped.
That makes two.
You've still done more than some of us here.
Quit saying '"I didn't participate." It's bullshit.
Niebuhr Mark.
Step forward if you know this man.
Let's go.
Step forward if you know this man.
No one knows you.
But maybe you do.
Erich.
Hey, Erich!
Don't you recognize me?
It's me, Mark Niebuhr.
I broke my arm. It's me, Mark.
We were together at the station.
Please, tell them that you know me.
I know who you are.
Erich Seifert from Pirna.
I used to describe movies to you.
"Comrades at Sea"
"Dr. Crippen an Bord"
And "Kongo-Express" with René Deltgen and "Sergeant Berry" with
Hans Albers.
And "The Woman of My Dreams" with Marika Rökk.
And "Südseeliebe"
I sang the song for you.
Accross the sea to the beach with green palms
Arrives a boat from a distant land
A fairy tale island that I see
Greets me softly with a tune
To the white sails in the blue sea
And tomorrow it'll sing farewell.
What can you tell me about Major Lundenbroich?
We believe he burned down a prison with people inside.
I know nothing.
He's not on the toilet.
He's bawling.
Step out, Niebuhr.
Where were you today?
Everyone wants to know.
Maybe you don't know where you belong anymore?
Let me do this.
Come out!
Niebuhr!
This is an interrogation.
Let's see how this goes.
Let's start with simple questions.
Name?
Answer, what is your name?
Mark Niebuhr.
Whatever.
You are probably lying, anyway.
We know why the Poles put you here.
We also know that you told them a lot today.
That's treason.
Do you understand?
Nothing but a vile treason.
But don't let that scare you.
You probably have no idea what you are doing.
You're young, and you can still rectify your mistakes.
You should tell the truth.
We'll decide together what to tell the Poles.
You need to get yourself together.
Leave me alone.
Leave me alone, you idiots!
Believe me when I say it, I really wasn't a Nazi.
I'd almost married a Jew.
They had pretty women.
My fiancé's last name was Chorin.
Anne-Dorre Chorin.
That was after 1933.
Here we were in love, engaged, and about to get married.
During the time of the Röhm putsch, the Nürnberg laws, etc.
Tumultuous times.
One day I found a note in my mailbox: "Isn't my finace's name not Cohn?"
You know what that implies, Cohn instead of Chorin.
"Haven't you seen the little Cohn?"
I didn't take that kind of blackmail seriously.
However, as a government employee, I got a bit alarmed.
Occasionally, I thought I'd recognized a semitic trait on her.
Like the strange shape of her eyelid.
But we sorted it all out. She was a pure blonde Aryan.
After I had married Ms.Chorin
we'd laugh about it all.
They should've followed through with Operation Sea Lion.
With Gibraltar, too.
Had we seized Gibraltar in 1940, we wouldn't have lost Tunesia later.
Franco didn't want to get involved.
The Legion managed to pull out.
And the bastard goes neutral.
I was a special appointee at the Reichsbank.
I can say it now.
We were ready to take over the British rail industry.
Does your arm still hurt?
What's happening outside?
It's springtime.
Was the doctor Polish?
Yes.
Did he say anything?
Nothing.
The Poles are better than these guys here.
They'll destroy you.
You said you didn't belong here?
The entire war I was just a truck driver.
I wasn't like the ones in here.
I didn't issue orders. I had no privileges.
I was just a driver.
I was only interested in cars.
And why are you here?
A mix up.
Mistaken for someone else.
I'll get out soon, you'll see.
I told them about what I'd done.
Hoping I'll get some advice.
But now they don't talk to me anymore.
They only talk about themselves.
Karl-Heinz Fenske!
Here!
Let's go.
What happened?
What did they want?
What did they do with you?
Considering that we don't know what they want from us
it's your duty to tell us everything.
If they treated you lawfully.
The kid's gone mad.
He isn't faking it.
The gasman hanged himself.
Give me a hand.
I've got my sentence.
They've sentenced me to death.
What did you say?
What's going on?
I drove the truck of death.
What does that mean?
The gas truck.
Never heard of it?
It looked like a butcher's truck.
It had sealed doors.
It fit seventy people.
I had to connect an unusual tube to the exhaust.
And let the engine run.
And drive to the pits.
Ten tours per day.
Always full.
Men, women, old, young.
Shit.
You get used to it.
Get rid of the pest.
They hummed like bees inside.
And now, I'm sentenced to death.
And what did you do?
Me?
You had to have done someting.
Everyone here is guilty of something.
Tell me.
Not me.
What did you do, you pig?
Wait here.
Karl-Heinz Fenske.
Comarades, the Jew is coming to get me.
Cauliflower goes with nutmeg.
Not much, though.
There's probably
a perfect measure of nutmeg.
For a mid-size cauliflower
a quarter teaspoon.
You are not supposed to tase it.
But you do.
Time for the economics lesson.
Let's go.
Right.
Some things appear to be lawful.
Can you save yourself?
Will they spare you?
Something is going on between you and the Poles.
I'd be willing
to cooperate, too.
I understand what they are after.
I'm in a stupid position.
I wasn't even there.
We had to destroy a prison.
I put someone else in charge.
God, it makes no sense
that they'd hang me.
It's absurd, Niebuhr!
Accusations against certain individuals can be justified.
Against certain comardes, that is.
The army can't be held accountable for everything.
Not for the camps, for instance.
Not for certain actions.
Not for certain methods.
And Warsaw?
The army had nothing to do with it?
Fine.
You can have Fenske, or whatever his name was.
And the pervert from the gas company.
What was I?
I did my duty where I was.
And the enemies were not just in the battlefield.
Isn't that right, General?
There were those who killed.
And those who arranged the transports.
Not that anyone would hold the Reichsbahn responsible.
That's legal bullshit.
I was responsible.
Of course.
For hundreds of trains daily.
In all possible directions.
For that
I was responsible.
Even when the war circumstances allow for tough actions,
taking hostages included,
we must refrain from certain violations.
That's the European law, even here in Poland.
I rely on the League of Nations.
and even on Churchill.
What did I do?
I headed a unit that searched for benign pictures.
I know nothing about art.
Listen, kid
One is for certain.
You'll not leave here alive.
Mark Niebuhr.
A woman from Lublin
has accused you of shooting her daughter.
She witnessed the execution.
During a raid.
We found out that you
were not in Lublin, after all.
That matches with your testimony.
You are Mark Niebuhr.
And you were not in Lublin.
Take that.
April, 25th '46.
Don't expect us to apologize.