war drama directed
by : Stefan Ruzowitzky featuring
: Karl Markovics - August Diehl - Devid Striesow - Martin Brambach
- Dolores Chaplin running
time : 1 hour 39 minutes
Writer/director Stefan
Ruzowitzky explores the moral corrosion of Nazi complicity with this tightly
wound adaptation of Adolf Burger's fact-based book The Devil's Workshop.
Salomon Sorowitsch (Karl Markovics) may be a talented artist at heart,
but his desire for wealth has driven him to use his creativity for more
nefarious means. Arrested by the police inspector Herzog (Devid Striesow)
at the onset of World War II, Sorowitsch is sent to the notorious Mauthausen
concentration camp. It's not long before Salomon's thinly veiled opportunism
earns him a relatively comfortable position as the camp's resident sketch
artist, and five years later he is mysteriously swept away to Sachsenhausen.
Upon arriving at the camp, Sorowitsch discovers that Herzog, now a commandant,
is attempting to destabilize the economies of the Allies while simultaneously
funding the Nazi war machine by assembling a special team of counterfeit
artists to create millions in fraudulent pounds and dollars. As the operation
gets under way, Sorowitsch finds the efforts of the team continually undermined
by unyieldingly idealistic collotype specialist Adolf Burger (August Diehl).
In the months that follow, the team wrestles with their consciences as
Axis forces are gradually overwhelmed by Allied might. The Counterfeiters
won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film.
