Michael's Movie Grade: B+
A very well-made biopic.
Bonhoeffer was a man who completely deserves to have a movie about him. He was a German pastor, who stood up against Adolph Hitler and against the church when it followed this horrible man. Yet he always felt, he had to help in more ways than just preaching and he helped in any way he could even when it was very dangerous. This movie captures just what made this man so great, while still painting a very human portrait of him. Though it is never slow paced, it takes its time to let us get to know the man, instead of rushing into the important things he has done. The scenes where he is in the U.S. with his good friend (a black pastor) help us see what helped shape him into the great man he would become. It is during these scenes that we see his faith in God become something deeper than just reading the bible and him learn just how much prejudice exists in this world. We also even get a good glimpse into another side of the man as he discovers jazz music for the first time and falls in love with it (if Louis Armstrong was on stage the first time you hear jazz, you would fall in love with it too). These moments don't add much to the story but do make this film feel much more real to us and the man much more human.
This movie does follow the conventional bio-pic storytelling and doesn't really do anything new. Because of this it doesn't really stand out from similar movies as much as it should. However, the story and subject are more than interesting enough to make up for this.
All in all, an excellent movie.
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