Labyrinth of Lies

Director: Giulio Ricciarelli, Germany , 2014, 118 mins

Germany, late 1950s: The “economic miracle” is in full swing, things are going well for people and they’d rather forget all about the horrors of the Nazi era. But then the journalist Thomas Gnielka causes a civil commotion. One of his friends has identified a former Auschwitz guard. Now Gnielka wants to take this man, who is meanwhile working as a teacher, to court in Frankfurt. However, his plan is not taken up. Only the young public prosecutor Johann Radmann agrees to take on the case, against his supervisor’s will. He finds himself enclosed in a net of repression, denial and romanticisation. During these years, some say they’ve never heard of Auschwitz, and others want to forget all about it as soon as possible.