Nuremberg

Rated PG-13 • Theaters

Back when I was a history professor, I often found myself teaching the second half of Western Civilization. As the semester wound down, I usually asked my students which person from the course they would most want to meet and why. A surprising number said Adolf Hitler. These bright young things weren’t crypto-Nazis; rather, they expressed a desire to find out what had made Hitler so evil. They felt he must have had some trauma that turned him bad, and they wished they could talk with him to figure out what it was. These 18-year-olds had an amusing self-confidence in their own powers of psychoanalysis.

Even so, the question of how the Nazi regime could perpetrate such monstrous deeds still haunts us. Many people at the time couldn’t believe the rumors of atrocities. The reports seemed too horrible. And as the war fades from living memory, some people have forgotten how cruel humans can be to one another. The historical drama Nuremberg reminds us of humanity’s potential for brutality and gives an honest answer to my students’ question: Why were the Nazis so bad?

The film begins on the last day of the war in Europe, with the capture of Hermann Göring. Göring, played by Academy Award winner Russell Crowe, is the highest ranking Nazi official still alive. The Allies discuss what to do with him. Most of the military brass prefer the idea of simply shooting him, but U.S. Supreme Court Justice Robert H. Jackson, played by the wonderful Michael Shannon, wants to put Göring and the other captured Nazis on trial to expose their crimes. Army psychiatrist Doug Kelley, played by Rami Malek, another Academy Award winner, is tasked with ensuring the prisoners stay mentally fit and don’t commit suicide.

Nuremberg possesses two storylines that start to converge toward the film’s climax. One storyline follows the difficulties Justice Jackson faces in prosecuting the Nazi leadership. No one had ever attempted anything like this before. It wasn’t feasible to try these men in a German court, but what legal authority would an international tribunal have? And if they did get to trial what would they be accused of? There was no case law to bolster the claims of war crimes.

Putting the Nazis on trial was a bit of a gamble. Would it be possible for them to successfully plead their innocence? In televising the proceedings, were the Allies running the risk of portraying these men as sympathetic victims? Or worse yet, were the Allies giving the Nazis yet another opportunity to infect the world with their anti-­Semitic hatred?

The other storyline involves Kelley’s interactions with the Nazi prisoners, especially his relationship with Göring—the relationship at the heart of the film. The psychiatrist takes his job as prison doctor seriously, looking after both the physical and mental health of the Nazis, but his interest in Göring and the others isn’t entirely altruistic.

Kelley hopes to write a book about his experience. He wants to psychologically define evil, and he’s essentially asking the same question my students did: What makes these Nazis different from us? Kelley views evil as a pathology that must be explained away.

Göring makes for a fascinating figure, and Crowe hypnotizes us with his performance—his Göring is simultaneously gregarious and malevolent. As the movie progresses, the psychiatrist becomes ensnared in the Nazi’s web. Seeing the proud figure humbled in prison elicits sympathy from both Kelley and the audience. But clarity comes when Justice Jackson’s Nuremberg trial cuts through the manipulation and sentimentality.

Part of the brilliance of Nuremberg is that it doesn’t merely depict Nazi atrocities. We’ve been confronted with those images in countless films. In fact, the sheer number of WWII movies tends to numb us to the terrible reality. This film is different because we see the characters discover for the first time the extent of the horror, and their reactions to these sickening images arouse a greater reaction in the audience than the images might have created on their own.

But what about that nagging question: Why were the Nazis so bad? Kelley eventually arrives at the Biblical answer. The Nazis aren’t any different from you or me. They were evil because they were human, and we fool ourselves if we think that 80 years later sin no longer crouches at our own doors.