Post World War II in Germany as British colonel Lewis Morgan is assigned to live in Hamburg. His wife Rachael has travelled from England to be with him as he continues his job. Tension with the German Stephen Lubert and his daughter Freda who owned the house as they allowed to stay.
In theory this film should be very impressive given the three leads, but that was not to be the case as it made the running time feel twice as long at times. Which really was such a shame as I had been looking forward to seeing this one. I love watching films about World War II and thought the aftermath would be a very different type of film to those we have had in the past.
The thing is we are given three or four smaller plots, none of which are explored in great detail. We already know something is going to happen between Stephen and Rachael as it is so obvious from the very start. I would have really enjoyed that if the romance or lust had been built up in a better way. We only got one main scene which was very risky for the pair as Lewis suddenly returned to the house. I felt as though we needed more depth to that relationship. I mean we got to see how Rachael and Lewis who I am guessing had spent years apart, the timeline was never really made fully clear. But the death of their young son certainly put a huge strain on the marriage as well. Lewis not really helping his wife in the most tragic event.
It tries to put in the tension between the English and Germans with neither being to understand the actions of the other. How they cannot really comprehend the actions after the war. With some Nazi's still branded and trying to carry out Hitler's orders despite the war being over and won. The loss for Germany was huge and the British were attempting to help them rebuild. That was never going to work out very well though.
A little disappointing then in all honesty as I just expected more. One of the main things I actually got from the film was that Alexander Skarsgård can pull off cardigans and jumpers. That probably sounds quite strange but if you see the film I am sure you will understand what I mean, I think I did fall for him just a little bit! Keira Knightley has been in plenty of films like this now and she pulls it off well. Jason Clarke has been in a lot of films in recent years and this was another different genre he can add to his filmography.
I cannot really say too much about the scenes either as most of them take place in the house. So nothing spectacular in terms of how visual the film was, as not a huge amount for them to work with. As I mentioned earlier slightly disappointing, even though I wasn't expecting a huge amount from this one.
