Der Transport

I liked "Destination Death" a lot and found it very exciting. The plot takes place in Germany, at a location between Passau and Regensburg in March 1945: Shortly before the end of the war, the visually impaired reserve officer Lieutenant Felix Bleck (Hannes Messermer), who was employed as a guard in a military prison, was given the order, together with three other (war-disabled) soldiers, to lead 40 prisoners in a train across the German Reich to the Western Front, where the men were to be deployed in a penal battalion. The lieutenant makes a fateful decision: he wants to take over the train together with his prisoners and become a prisoner of war. To me, the plot of the film was fast-paced enough to keep me interested, and there was enough character study to show that there is always a human being behind the uniform. I also liked the performance of Hannes Messermer, whom I remembered as von Luger from the 1963 masterpiece "The Great Escape". For me, this film also showed different approaches to man in dictatorship and democracy. People who were rebellious and unenthusiastic towards the Nazi regime were just worthless cannon fodder for the Nazis. Democracy, in turn, needs such individuals, and these people could prove themselves in building the future post-war Germany.