Main Cast: Richard Fescud, Alec Guinness, Simon Ward, Adolfo Celi, Diane Cilento, Gabriele Ferzetti
Release Year: 1973
Country: IT/UK
Run Time: 108 minutes
MPAA Rating: PG
Plot
Alec Guinness plays against stereotype, imbuing his Adolf Hitler with an introverted solemnity in Ennio De Concini's Hitler: The Last Ten Days. Set almost entirely inside Hitler's Berlin bunker, the film chronicles the dying days of the Third Reich as the Allied armies close in on Berlin. Guinness's Hitler is an enclosed depressive who sinks slowly into madness, depression, and ultimately suicide as his 1,000-Year Reich collapses around him. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide
Roy Walker - Art Director, Mischa Spoliansky - Conductor, Richard Dalton - First Assistant Director, Ennio de Concini - Director, Kevin Connor - Editor, John Heyman - Executive Producer, Mischa Spoliansky - Composer (Music Score), Ennio Guarnieri - Cinematographer, John Heyman - Producer, Wolfgang Reinhardt - Producer, Peter Handford - Sound/Sound Designer, Norman Priggen - Supervisor/Manager, Ennio de Concini - Screenwriter, Maria Pia Fusco - Screenwriter, Ivan Moffat - Screenwriter, Wolfgang Reinhardt - Screenwriter, Gerhard Boldt - Book Author
The movie opens with Hitler's 56th birthday on April 20, 1945, and ends 10 days later, with his suicide on April 30.
Inaccuracies
The motif of this movie is that everybody Hitler ever knew or cared for abandoned him, one by one, before his suicide. While this is believed to be partially true, the movie takes liberties by having everyone, including Eva Braun, betray him.
Compared to reliable accounts of Hitler's final days, this movie is not considered accurate. More specifically:
Guinness portrays Hitler with gusto, whereas in real life, Hitler spent his last days drugged and brooding.
Hitler's birthday party is pictured as festive. In real life, Hitler had to be heavily sedated simply to make an appearance. Also, the movie does not show Albert Speer, Hermann Göring or Heinrich Himmler, who also showed up for the party.
Hitler spends time playing with his wooden model of Germania in the bunker, wishing Albert Speer were with him. The real bunker did not hold this wooden model, and Speer actually did visit him several times.
Hitler is shown being intimate with Eva Braun. In real life, he barely spent any time with her at all in the bunker.
Hitler is depicted as having shot himself almost on a whim, after Eva Braun takes poison to spite him. In reality, Hitler and Braun planned their suicides and had a formal "exit scene."
