Review: LABYRINTH OF LIES Is a Well-Executed Historical Drama

Right on the heels of Spielberg's latest film BRIDGE OF SPIES, comes another late-50s period piece, Giulio Ricciarelli's LABYRINTH OF LIES. The difference is time (slightly), place (by a few miles), and that Ricciarelli's film presents a more complex look at what justice really is in a difficult situation.

The film opens in 1958 Germany, with newly appointed German public prosecutor, Johann Radmann (Alexander Fehling). Young and ambitious, Radmann sees an opportunity for himself when a local journalist, Thomas Gnielka (Andre Szymanski), storms into the lobby of the Public Prosecutor's Office with Simon Kirsch (Johannes Krisch), a former Auschwitz inmate sure he's recognized a local school teacher as one of the guards that tormented him not so long ago. Radmann takes it upon himself to do some investigating after it becomes clear that none of his colleagues are interested in the case and is horrified to learn not only of the atrocities committed at Auschwitz, but that there are 8,000 former SS guards, former officers at Auschwitz, that are living normal lives, not paying for their actions during the war. Radmann pursues the case, determined to seek justice, but slowly loses his way as he finds that seemingly everyone around him is in some way complicit, in some way guilty.

LABYRINTH OF LIES is a thoughtful historical drama that mines material from a compelling, but often unexplored era. It's hard to imagine now, but not much was known in 1950s Germany about the crimes committed in Auschwitz during the Second World War, information about the industrialized murder machine suppressed or ignored. This may be why director Giulio Ricciarelli has chosen to make much of the horror of the Holocaust, and of Auschwitz in particular, hidden. Ricciarelli proves skillful in allowing the unseen to convey the unspeakable. We never see Simon's painting of the Angel of Death, or what lies left beneath Mr. Bichinsky's eye patch. Stories are recounted behind closed doors, the horror of which is conveyed through Mrs. Schmittchen's tears, color draining from a person's face, shaking hands, or a darting gaze.

Ricciarelli has crafted an evocative film, full of well-composed, wide shots. Nowhere is the film technically better than in two well-executed, mirrored montages. The first montage shows the witnesses coming in to testify about their experiences in Auschwitz and the second, later in the film, shows the men accused arrested and questioned. So much of the first focuses on mannerisms, whereas the second seemed to focus on the faces of the accused - tight close-ups on blank, remorseless faces.

As Radmann, Alexander Fehling convincingly plays a man who is unexpectedly forced to reconcile his entire worldview in the face of a much larger truth. Radmann, as a character, is a stickler for the rules, a man who is caught up in things being right or wrong, black or white. As such, Fehling begins the film stiff and unyielding, sticking out like a sore thumb. But he remains sympathetic in his naiveté and a fine guide as we follow him on a journey to figure out what is justice, what is right, in the aftermath of such a wrong. Other standouts in the film include Johannes Krisch as Simon, a traumatized man carrying around the guilt of the living, and Andre Szymanski as Gnielka, a man trying to atone for his past.

I should note that though LABYRINTH OF LIES is built against a backdrop of true events, the story is dramatized and the character of Radmann is entirely fictional, based on real-life prosecutors Joachim Kügler, Georg Friedrich Vogel, and Gerhard Wiese. But LABYRINTH OF LIES is not a documentary, so I won't hold it against the film.

LABYRINTH OF LIES starring Alexander Fehling, Andre Szymanski, Friederike Becht, Johannes Krisch, Hansi Jochmann, Johann von Bulow, and Robert Hunger-Buhler is rated R for a scene of sexuality.

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