REVIEWED - SOPHIE SCHOLL: THE FINAL DAYS/ SOPHIE SCHOLL: DIE LETZEN TAGE AN ACUTELY focused study, compiled from the official records, of the arrest, interrogation and execution of a young woman by angry zealots, this admirable film calls up memories of Dreyer's La Passion de Jeanne d'Arc.
This is, however a much less emotionally charged picture. Detailing the last days (it's in the title, so we're not giving anything away) of an iconic figure in the German opposition to the Nazi regime, the drama coolly details a number of lengthy exchanges between the accused and her Gestapo interrogator.
Much of the talk is procedural - Who? Where? Why? - but the gradual annihilation of Sophie Scholl's alibi and the subtle unveiling of vague doubts in her tormentor's conviction makes for compelling viewing.
Scholl and her brother were arrested in 1943 while distributing leaflets at Munich University. The German army was bogged down in Stalingrad and Scholl's organisation, the White Rose, was eager to make the public see that, with the eastern front going this badly and the Americans now massing in the west, victory had become unachievable. Marc Rothemund's nuanced direction of the judges, guards and secret policeman - some nervously hysterical; at least one softening to the rebels - suggests that the message may have been getting through.
This is a formidably dry film. Long sections of the script consist of two people addressing one another tensely across a desk. One is, in that regard, reminded of Richard Norton-Taylor's recent staged re-enactments of public events such as the Steven Lawrence trial and the Saville Inquiry.
Were it not graced with such a stirring, disciplined central performance by Julia Jentsch, Sophie Scholl might have become a little too worthy for its own good. As things work out, the forlorn glances and defiant grimaces Jentch discovers for her character inject drama into every scene.
