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The claustrophobic world of a WWII German U-boat; boredom, filth, and sheer terror.
This is the story of 42 raw recruits caught up in a war they didn't fully understand, and the Captain who must lead them in their struggle to survive.
Jürgen Prochnow: Capt.-Lt. Henrich Lehmann-Willenbrock - Der Alte
1981 hailed a victorious, historical triumph in film that would achieve iconic proportions upon and after it's conception. Director Wolfgang Petersen adapts Lothar G. Buchheim's novel and creates a story inspired by true events, a story and film which shows life aboard a submarine like no other. Das Boot is uniquely telling history in a truthful aspiring way which has yet to be echoed.
The premise: A German U-Boat with a crew as real as me or you. A time during WW2 where out of 30,000 German U-Boats only 10,000 survived.
Das Boot is as claustrophobic and as real as it gets, as one is watching it's the realest feeling audiences are given to actually being on a U-Boat Submarine. What other surprises does Das Boot throw into our laps? Of course, the lashings of humour, the sheer terror of red alert scenarios, and what it is like to be among men inebriating bestiality.
The Directors Cut was the version I was most impressed with, mainly due to the vast detail and length it attains. Wolfgan Petersen fully captures the mood and nature of what it would be like to be aboard one of these legendary vessels. As the crew waits, so do we. As explosions from Destroyers shower down from the surface, and planes let loose hails of bombing, we feel the pain the crew feels, and indeed the U-Boat itself, we feel for her.
''Now it all turns psychological, gentlemen.''
Das Boot's great achievement is its pacing. Petersen's an adept action movie director, and he brought that to bear in making his epic. The first half of the picture explores the paradox of the tortured boredom the sailors feel while awaiting the arrival of orders from headquarters, even though getting those orders will lead to certain terror and possible death. The crew's restlessness is palpable, yet never bores us as an audience. The men regale each other with dirty jokes and erotic anecdotes. One officer asks another for help with a crossword puzzle and the answers end up being "bath" and "love," the two things each man desperately wants more than anything. Slowly, we learn a little about the men on the boat, background information that humanizes them without flattening them into a collection of dramatic motivations. We don't get to know them intimately but learn their preoccupations, the sorts of details we'd discover if we were members of the crew.
The cast indeed equal a rough, sea faring, scruffy bunch...However this is realistic. Crews of these particular vessels weren't valued for their appearance or swave looks but for their skills and knowledge regarding mechanics and sea-faring.
Jürgen Prochnow as the captain, is the main character and protagonist, thus of a personal note, the only cast member famous enough for me to know, whom landed success in Hollywood after this film.
Herbert Grönemeyer, Klaus Wennemann, Klaus Wennemann, Hubertus Bengsch, and Uwe Ochsenknecht among many others churn out heralded performances which all give the crew a bravado totality, missing one would not be the same. This is in a sense a family unit whom audiences and I grew to love and became attached to.
Das Boot is a very long film, so if you can't handle that fact, this is perhaps not going to be the film for you. It's also from a time many people do not understand, the Second World War, thus this story is uniquely told from Germany's perspective in a very honest fashion.
My own reflection upon Das Boot is that it's undoubtedly a masterpiece oozing with qualities that transcend Awards and conventionality. It received 6 Oscar Nominations but no wins...Why? I can only guess the Academy voters are afraid to acknowledge masterpieces unless they fit biased criterias.
I just know Das Boot has the flawless cinematography, effects, realism, sound, writing and Screenplay that virtually has no rival since it was released, indeed 30 years later it still retains uniqueness.
Thus, Das Boot is the best submarine film, the best U-Boat educational and psychological assessment ever created upon film. Wolfgang Petersen deserves your respect, and indeed audiences. This is truly something to be admired and treasured.
''You have to have good men. Good men, all of them.''
10/10
