The Counterfeiters

This partly factual German film focuses on a master counterfeiter (of currency, passports, and seemingly anything else) who finds himself detained and thrust into a Nazi concentration camp during WWII. The cunning protagonist manages to secure himself a position as a camp artist, which frees him from the grueling labor and affords him special privileges. He is transfered to a new camp where he is forced to use his illicit skills - along with a group of other prisoners - for the benefit of his captors. A bit of unsteady camera work lends a slightly more organic, unsettling feel than other Holocaust films (not that the experience of mass genocide is something that can be, or should be desire to be, reproduced). Even so, the film assumes the viewer is somewhat familiar with the Holocaust, focusing less on the misery of life in the camps and more on the struggles between fellow prisoners, their taxing moral dilemma, and their unprecedented attempts at mass forgery.

WORTH WATCHING
Rating 3.5 out of 5
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Plot: 3.5
Imagery: 3
Originality: 3.5
Soundtrack: 2
Overall: 3.5