Bonhoeffer: Pastor. Spy. Assassin. (Movie Review)

    “It takes courage to face the dark.” So says German pastor Martin Niemöller in the movie Bonhoeffer: Pastor. Spy. Assassin. 

   And, in the words of another German church leader in the movie, “Bravery is a rare commodity. Especially when it’s needed most.” 

   This movie is about one of those rare men who showed incredible courage in the face of great evil in Nazi Germany, Dietrich Bonhoeffer. 

   Dietrich Bonhoeffer has been one of my greatest heroes from history for several years. So when I found out there was a new movie being made about him, I was quite excited, but I also didn’t want to set my expectations too high, because movies about my historical heroes are often disappointing, failing to fully portray them as they really were. 

   Well, this movie far exceeded my expectations. It is a truly excellent movie. In fact, I might even go so far as to put it at the very top of my favorite movies list. It’s that good. 

   Yes, it’s sad. But while I do love to laugh and enjoy a good clean comedy every now and then, the stories I love most are the ones that stir me to love God more and follow Christ more fully. And this movie does just that. 

   The screenplay is excellently written, so full of good quotes, many of them taken from Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s writings. There is so much scripture in the movie, too, but it is woven into the story very naturally; it does not feel forced or “preachy” at all. And the filmmaking is top-notch. 

   There are so many good themes in this movie, but I’ll just touch on the two that stood out to me the most. 

   “Living faith,” not “dead religion.”  This was a theme that Dietrich spoke and wrote of often. God is not looking for people who simply go to church and go through the motions of living a Christian life. He wants our hearts and our entire lives. Real, living faith changes us and affects every area of our lives. Christ is calling us to follow Him. And “when Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die.” For all of us, it means dying to ourselves, and for some, including Dietrich Bonhoeffer, it means actually giving up one’s life. 

   And courage. Dietrich Bonhoeffer saw his beloved country overtaken by the Nazis. In churches, they replaced the cross with the swastika and the Bible with Adolf Hitler’s book Mein Kampf. They sent Jews and people with disabilities to die in concentration camps. And that’s where they would also send anyone who stood against them. It took courage for Dietrich Bonhoeffer to boldly speak against the evils of the Nazis. He was not naively running into danger, thinking that everything would be all right. No, he had counted the cost and was prepared to give up his life. As he says in the movie, “Every act of courage carries a cost.” For Dietrich Bonhoeffer, it would cost everything. Yet he believed that “after the cross, came the resurrection life.” And that’s what gave him such incredible courage. 

   Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s relationships with his parents and siblings were a very important part of his life and they’re portrayed very well in the movie, as well as his relationships with his friend Eberhard Bethge, the English Bishop George Bell, and his American friends. The timing and details of a few events are altered a bit, but overall it’s kept very close to the true story. There was so much more that they could have added (Maria, the girl Dietrich became engaged to not long before he was arrested, isn’t in the movie, for one thing) but considering the movie is already a little over two hours, they had to stop somewhere. For the most part, I’m glad they didn’t cut anything that’s in it to make room for something else. It's not perfect, of course, (I've yet to see a move that is). But in my opinion, it got the most important parts right. 

   Overall, even though this movie deals with extreme darkness, it actually has much less violence and other content warnings than most World War II movies I’ve seen. But, just so you’re aware, I’ll give you the rundown. There are two or three curse words, and (like most people in Europe at the time), we see Dietrich and others smoke and drink (though never get drunk.) Dietrich gets punched or hit several times. Once he is beaten up pretty badly; most of it you don’t actually see, but you hear it happening offscreen. As a bus arrives at a concentration camp, we briefly see a pile of ashes/burnt remains. We see a prisoner attempt to escape and get shot, there’s brief footage of starving prisoners in concentration camps, and at the end, we see Dietrich at the gallows facing death. We see the rope get put around his neck, but then the camera goes dark and (thankfully) we don’t see the hanging actually done. 

   Overall, I thought this was an excellent movie about what it looks like to follow Christ and show real faith and courage in a time of great darkness. 

   If you’d like to learn more about Dietrich Bonhoeffer, I highly recommend Eric Metaxas’ biography of him. And if you’d like to read something shorter before committing to a 600 page biography, you can read my blog post about Dietrich Bonhoeffer here. 

As always, remember, “He who calls you is faithful, who also will do it,” (1 Thess. 5:24).

All for Him,

Savannah Jane

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