User Reviews

This is a 65-year-old movie which runs for roughly 105 minutes. Or you could also say, it is a movie from five years after the end of World War II. Or you could say it is a DEMA movie that was made immediately after the GDR came into existence. The core of the film is what I wrote in the title. It is almost entirely about what happened the years before, especially all the dead people in concentration camps and how the existence of these camps was perceived, if people knew what was happening there etc. There is also a scene near the end where basically everybody who was somewhat guilty pretends he didn't know what exactly was going on and puts the blame on other people. A big part of the film plays at a chemical factory where gas was produced that was also used to kill people in the camps. The main character is a renowned chemist, still an honorable man though and his bosses are the really evil people.

Apart from his profession, he also struggles with his family, especially his son, who decides to keep working in the factory after the end of World War II, even if the same ruthless people are in charge there. When the staff is order to keep producing explosives in the factory, a catastrophe happens and hundreds of people lose their lives. The bosses (who call themselves in the most modest manner "Council of the Gods") say it was an accident with an ether cloud and nobody is to blame, but the color of the cloud tells the truth about their despicable motives in the end. So this is also a story on greed. I thought all the actors were great and even if I am not the biggest fan of old black-and-white movies I really enjoyed watching this. Maybe the very last camera shots were a tad too GDR-patriotic for my taste, but this does not hurt the overall perception at all. Recommended and a positive surprise as the writer trio was not too prolific really in terms of writing for film when this was made. On a side-note, the film's score comes from famous German composer Hanns Eisler. And the film's director died only three years ago at the age of 101.

"The riveting story of the collaboration between Nazi scientists and chemical giant IG Farben"?

Perhaps.

There would be few movies with a cast of more morally bankrupt characters than this. A classic of cold war propaganda (1950), and dedicated to "the friends of freedom all over the world" it is of some passing interest.

Read all about it! Brilliant young scientist, idealist with a social conscience who is appalled by the company's manufacture of poison gas, rocket fuel and explosives… Manipulative industrialists who conspire to support Hitler; their sole aim to line their own pockets with the massive profits to be had from travelling hand in glove with the military…Corrupt American companies and officials in cahoots with these unscrupulous barons, willing partners in a war against the real enemy – communism!

Oh dear, such a band of stereotypes. The American connection, one Mr Lawson, is the go-between for US interests both industrial and governmental in war-time Germany. He is a ringer for Boris Badenov, I kid you not. AND watch out for Mabel, his wise-cracking associate. She must be heard to be believed. (German is obviously not her mother tongue, and if you're familiar with Glenn Miller in his famous radio conversations with Ilse Weinberger, you'll know how painful it can get.)

In the Nuremberg courtroom the whole collusion scandal is set to explode, but between personal massages in their cells and a total disregard for any judicial process (knowing the prosecution case has been fixed from high up so as to not ask the tough questions), the buck is passed down the line. No-one – owners or directors - has any knowledge of just what terrible shenanigans those evil Nazis got up to with the company's inventive concoctions. "Doctor, this line of questioning is making me unwell, please wheel me outside."

And so the Council of the Gods – the grand title the industrialists gave to themselves – is ultimately slapped on the wrist with a limp lettuce leaf, neatly sidestepping any penalty for their crimes. Their fortunes remain at their disposal in Switzerland. They are merely waiting for the right opportunity.

Returning to the company's massive factory complex at war's end (left completely untouched by allied bombing, thanks to the secret deals between Mr Lawson, the Council and the US government – you gotta love the accuracy of their bomb-sights), our idealist scientist organises his fellow researchers in the manufacture of items beneficial to mankind – not plasma screens, but fertilizers and the like. All looks set for a reclaiming of the moral high ground, an atonement for past sins and the establishment of a post-war worker's utopia, when in step the shadowy figures who control the money and the big political agenda. The original regime is reinstated and so too is the production of sinister matériel.

Down the line, there is an explosion of Krakatoan proportions, a confrontation between labour (led by our young idealist) and the bosses, and a finale that would not have left a dry eye in the house (or a dry seat depending on where one's allegiances lay).

I found the first half of this movie to be somewhat turgid, as the behind-the-scenes machinations were played out by comically ruthless, dandified, and utterly one dimensional figures. As the Nuremberg scenes progressed and the success of the military industrial conspiracy became apparent, there were some redeeming factors and the pace quickened.

Worthwhile if only to get a glimpse at what the other side was thinking about life at the big end of town in the Third Reich, and for a cavalcade of the most dastardly villains. It is quite heavy handed in its techniques and is by no means a cinematic gem. An attempt yes to portray the same dilemmas and post-war introspection as classics such as Rotation, The Second Track and The Murderers Are Among Us, but with nowhere near their level of finesse and poignancy.

This Cold War propaganda film is based on the 1947 book I.G. Farben by American author Richard Sasuly about the Nuremberg trial of the chemical giant I.G. Farben. It is a skewed anti-war, anti-American, anti-industrialist story about the collaboration between the Nazi regime and international corporations to produce poisonous gases that were used to murder millions in the Holocaust. Sasuly had chaired the Kilgore Committee, which investigated I.G. Farben on behalf of the American military, and his book was based largely on his own experiences. The real I.G. Farben trial, or "chemical trial," was the sixth of twelve war crimes trials that U.S. authorities held in Nuremberg after World War II. The indictment against former I.G. Farben directors was filed on May 3, 1947, and the trial lasted nearly a year, from August 1947 until July 1948. Thirteen of the twenty-four defendants were convicted, but they received light sentences and early release from prison. The film depicts a much speedier trial before seven German judges, whereas the real trial, which lasted nearly a year, was heard by four U.S. judges. The film is nonetheless instructive because it reflects the German perspective of the expansive power of the prosecutor. Council of the Gods tells the legal story, starting in 1933, of I.G. Farben, a colossal German industrial corporation, that helps supply Hitler's war effort and manufactures the gas used in the gas chambers of the concentration camps. The directors of the company call themselves the "Council of the Gods" in reference to the painting that is displayed in the room where they meet. The painting depicts Greek gods who counsel Zeus in the clouds as a violent battle ensues among the mortals below them on Earth. After the war, the company directors and others are charged with war crimes and held in pretrial detention pending the so-called "chemical trial" in Nuremberg. The seven-member panel consists of German judges. They all wear black robes, white shirts, and white bow ties. Because Germany is occupied by the United States, an American flag is draped on the wall behind the bench. The American prosecutors, Messrs. Wood and Lawton, are seated at a table directly below the judges' bench with their assistants. Mr. Wood is dressed in business attire, and military counsel Mr. Lawton is dressed in a U.S. Army uniform. About twenty defendants sit in a separate dock and their German defense attorneys sit in front of them. All of the defense attorneys are dressed in black robes, white shirts, and white bow ties. The prosecutor and the presiding judge conduct most of the questioning, and occasionally defense counsel poses a question which the presiding judge restates to the witness. In the German Civil Law tradition and the principle of objectivity, the prosecutor elicits testimony that tends to help the defendants at the expense of the reputation of the U.S. and German governments. During recess, the military prosecutor Mr. Lawton consults with the presiding judge about having Mr. Wood replaced with a more partial prosecutor, and the presiding judge agrees. The new prosecutor Mr. Howard negotiates a deal with the defendants whereby they will receive light sentences in exchange for dropping their request to call executives of Standard Oil and Royal Dutch Shell about their collaboration with Germany during the war. The defendants agree to the deal, and they are soon released from prison. At the end of the film, I.G. Farben has resumed its production of explosives, and an accident at the plant claims the lives of several workers. This last scene is based on the real-life explosion, on July 28, 1948, at the BASF Ludwisghafen factory which killed 280 people and seriously injured thousands of others. The accident occurred during development of the film, and the filmmakers decided to incorporate it.