World War II was the scene for some of the most atrocious acts of humankind, specifically the acts committed by Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party, as they attempted a genocide of the German people. Naturally, as the war was over, and the German political apparatus decimated, it was necessary to sort out who was responsible for what, and, indeed, if they could be found and held responsible in the first place. Judgement at Nuremberg is Stanley Kramer’s 1961 re-creation of one of the more important trials that took place after the war. In this cinematic portrayal, three American judges (including one played by Spenser Tracy) are asked to pass judgement on four of their own -- four German judges (Burt Lancaster among them) who served on the bench during the Hitler regime, and made judgements that directly or indirectly contributed to the mass slaughter and persecution of Jews and others. The question that must be answered is whether these judges, who were, after all, officially at least, merely doing their job, working for the state, should be held accountable for rulings based on the laws created, not by the judges, but by Hitler and his confidants.

Both the prosecution and the defence are led by strong-willed, strongly-worded individuals. Richard Widmark is the hawkish, blustering American military man, who bluntly states that these men aren’t being tried for mere decisions they made on the bench, or for breaking constitutional laws, etc, but for being involved in “atrocities”, “murder”, and so on. Maximillian Schell is the German defence, who considers this trial to be more than just a trial with four defendants, but a trial in which all of Germany will be judged -- if these guys, guys who were only doing their job, who were only following the rules of their country, can be tried and prosecuted, then all of Germany ought to be, since the people of Germany were only serving their country, were only being good patriots.

Virtually the entire movie takes place in the courtroom, although there are a few diversions involving Tracy’s character, who meets up with a few people outside the courtroom who are not quite convinced of the need for all of these trials. He meets up with Marlene Dietrich, who plays the widow of a German officer who was executed as punishment following another trial, also prosecuted by Widmark. She is bitterly resent of her husband’s fate, saying that the Americans never even gave him the decency to be executed by firing squad -- her belief is much like that of the courtroom defence, in that he was only serving his country, so he shouldn’t be considered on equal footing with Hitler. Tracy also talks with German servants who assist him in the house that he stays at -- the servants seem unwilling to discuss what is was like during the Nazi regime, saying that they did not know anything about the concentration camps, and so on. The suggestion is, of course, that the German people just didn’t want to know what was going on.

This is one of those movies with the sort of all-star cast that could easily overwhelm the storyline. We’ve got Spencer Tracy, Burt Lancaster, Richard Widmark, Judy Garland, Montgomery Clift, Marlene Dietrich, and even a small role for William Shatner, as one of Tracy’s assistants. The most interesting thing, however, is that it’s the non-Hollywood guy, Maximillian Schell, who makes the most impact. While much of the crowd consists of old Hollywood faces with acting much in tune with the 1950‘s and 60‘s Golden Age, Schell is quite possibly a bit more intense, devoid of the mannerisms of the big stars. He almost sounds like an actor of today rather than of fifty years ago. Interestingly enough, it was Schell who won the Best Actor Oscar in 1961, even though there are actual legends in the cast who could have easily gotten hardware just for being in this movie.

Schell has the toughest role in the whole picture. He is the defendant for guys whose job during the Third Reich was to uphold Hitler’s laws, from sterilization of people who were deemed “unfit” (and who were mostly Jews or political radicals), to forbidding Jews and non-Jews from fraternizing in any fashion -- and, even so, the road to those convictions were paved with dubious evidence, lies, and humiliation of the accused and the witnesses. In a fair trial, all defendants have the right to be defended, and that includes judges working for the Third Reich, and Schell’s character gets the job, and like any movie lawyer (and real lawyers, too, of course), he speaks on behalf of his client at all times, and has no choice but to pick at the witnesses’ credibility, just to make his case, even as the witnesses have experienced some really nasty stuff at the hands of the Nazis. One of his most poisonous scenes is when he grills a witness about the Nazi’s policy of sterilization -- the witness says unfavourably that it was essentially the Nazi’s invention; to sterilize people who were deemed “unfit” for the German race -- Schell uses that to his advantage, and brings up a statement to prove that the desirability of sterilization was not unique to Hitler. So he quotes a positive judgement of sterilization -- from a judge in the state of Virginia, proving that even the noble Americans were not above such outrageous pronouncements. Schell is also very brutal toward the witnesses played by Montgomery Clift and Judy Garland. We never really get an explicit revelation of Schell’s true feelings, although you can bet that he really does believe that he needs to defend these men not because they deserve to be spared, but because Germany’s, and its citizens‘, self-respect hangs in the balance.

I’ll admit that some of the actors in this movie seem a bit miscast, as their star power somewhat diminishes the role that they are playing. Clift and Garland, especially, make glorified cameos -- they are supposed to be playing ordinary Germans affected by the rulings of the judges on trial (Clift plays a somewhat feeble baker affected by sterilization, while Garland plays a young woman who was imprisoned for perjury, as she would not finger a old Jewish friend as having sexual relations with her), but they aren’t ordinary -- they are Montgomery Clift and Judy Garland! If these two small roles were actually played by character actors, less well-known faces, they probably would have been more powerful (both of these actors tend to overdo it a bit, and Garland, especially, doesn‘t convince a whole lot as a young woman, considering that this was made in 1961! Maybe if this film were made 20 years earlier!)-- although at least the dialogue written for them is effective enough.

Sue (millinocket) was quite dismayed when I told her that her precious Burt Lancaster played one of the judges on trial -- however, it would be pretty clear to any viewer that Burt is not depicted as an evil man, certainly not on the same level as some others, including the other defendants. His character has been set up as someone who, before the Nazis, was considered a great, independent, moral legal mind -- so, for Lancaster’s character, we want to know what went wrong. I actually don’t think Lancaster , despite the novelty of his casting, is miscast -- he stays pretty quiet for most of the picture, until he disrupts the courtroom and demands to say his piece, and what he says afterwards certainly doesn’t fit the mentality of an evil Nazi.

Stanley Kramer also directed Ship of Fools, which I thought was overlong, tedious, and over-stuffed with characters and plots. Judgement at Nuremberg is almost an hour longer, but is much more bearable -- for one thing, the film is more focused, as it’s all about the trial. It’s almost radical, as the film doesn’t even have a lot of side-plots; many of the courtroom scenes are very lengthy, and there are only a few scenes that don’t take place in any courtroom or military environment (most involving Tracy and Dietrich). The courtroom scenes themselves are intense, as there are no fancy shots or flourishes of score music, but merely the actors and words, projected at extreme length -- Widmark and Schell yell a lot, and that’s enough special effects for me.

In the real trials, of course, the Americans would be speaking English, and the Germans would be speaking German, but this is a Hollywood movie, which would naturally have to be all-English. The movie gets around this by a slight-of-hand -- during the first courtroom scene, indeed, the English are speaking English and the German are speaking German, with microphones and headphones and interpreters all around so everybody can understand each other. Schell begins his opening arguments in German, while we see and hear interpreters in the foreground. Abruptly, the camera zooms in on Schell, and he finishes his words in English ……for the rest of the film, everyone “speaks” English, even though, occasionally, those headphones are still being used, as we are still to understand that there is a language barrier in the courtroom, if not in the living room where you are watching this movie.

What’s nice about this movie is how it depicts both sides, and actually makes them both crediable. Although you may cringe at Schell’s defence when he grills some of the witnesses, making it sound as if he’s justifying Nazi atrocities, his whole notion of needing to defend the people of Germany makes sense. Yet Widmark counters with real evidence of what happened, as he shows us graphic (surprisingly so for a movie of this vintage) videos of concentration camps. This does make the ending interesting, since, naturally, only one side will win………..but when both sides have some meaningful ideas, which one is the one that will result in the truest form of justice?

As a courtroom drama, Judgement at Nuremberg is exciting to watch and to listen to. And while I’m certain that many things were changed to make this Hollywood version of a true story, this movie is also a good showcase for showing us how evil the Nazi regime really was, and also a showcase for how a Hollywood movie ought to be.

Recommended:
Yes

Viewing Format: VHS
Video Occasion: Better than Watching TV