The greatest movie ever made..!

This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

Easily the biggest piece of Right wing non sense propaganda I ever saw.

It's a good bad... and worth a popcorn matinée. While it's easy to lament what could have been...

Obviously deeply felt by the writer and director, immaculately designed on what appears a lavish budget by veteran Alexander Trauner (who appears early on playing the caretaker) and photographed in widescreen suffused in a nostalgiac glow by cameraman Bruno De Keyzer, its hard to believe there is still a large enough audience out there ignorant of the tragedy about to unfold; about which it doesn't really have anything terribly original to say. But Konradin's credulous willingness to give a demagogic snake-oil salesman like Hitler the benefit of the doubt - "He really impressed me. He is totally sincere. He has such... he has true passion. I think he can save our country. He is our only hope." - remains depressingly familiar today. And the leisurely pace at which it proceeds conveys something of the gradualness with which the appalling reality overwhelms its characters.But for the final, very abrupt, 'surprise' ending to work, the audience is assumed not to be able to recognise the ferrety face of Roland Freisler seen throughout, who ironically - as played by Roland Schäfer looking remarkably like John Malkovich in heavy eye-liner - comes across here as a relatively restrained version of the bellowing maniac preserved for posterity in newsreels. And would it really have taken over forty years and a trip all the way back to the very school were they were originally pupils for Henry to finally learn Konradin's fate?

Robards delivers a wonderful performance as an aging Jewish man who was sent away from Germany aged 16 in 1932 by his parents, for his own safety. He'd befriended a high-born non-Jewish boy his age prior to his departure. He returns to Germany to find out what happened to his friend. The ending is surprising and very deeply moving as a result of the significant, lengthy, and gratifying cinematic demonstration of their growing friendship as boys.

I can't help but being impressed by the charm and angst that this film produces. On one hand we have two lonely boys from completely different backgrounds and religions who form a strong friendship, only to have politics and antisemitism destroy it. The photography is awesome. The acting superb. A terribly tragic feeling is left with the viewer at the end of the film, although one can also find redemption. A haunting movie.

This movie involves around two male teenagers. They spend most of their time together. They barely interact with any other classmates. It is a sweet boyhood friendship movie, but is it also hinting at a homosexual relationship? There are so many other classmates that the newcomer could have picked, he picked this particular one.Generally speaking, this is a good movie. You won't even notice when it comes to an end. It seems to be so sudden.