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On
New Year's Eve, 1938, Christian Diestl, a Bavarian shoemaker and part-time
ski instructor, is romancing American Margaret Freemantle at a party.
When Margaret asks Christian if he is a Nazi party member, he replies that
he is not at all political but believes that the Nazis stand for something
hopeful in Germany. He explains that he had to abandon his medical
studies due to the lack of free universities in Germany, and that Hitler has
promised to change that. Margaret is dismayed by Christian's
affiliation and leaves the party early.
World War II begins and, on June 24, 1940, when
France surrenders to Germany, Christian, now a Nazi lieutenant, reports to
Captain Hardenburg on the steps of Sacre Coeur in Paris.
In New York, singer Michael Whiteacre, hoping to
be exempted from army service, is examined by the draft board and told to
report for induction in about three months' time. At the draft board,
Michael meets Noah Ackerman, who has recently arrived in New York from
California. Michael invites Noah to a party that evening where he
meets Margaret, now Michael's girl friend, and is introduced to Hope
Plowman, who is from Vermont. Noah escorts Hope to her temporary home
in Brooklyn and instantly falls in love with her.
In Paris, Christian's fellow officer Brandt has
arranged a blind date for him with Françoise, a friend of the French woman,
Simone, he is seeing. Although Françoise at first asks Christian how
many Frenchmen he has killed, she later apologizes, explaining that her
husband was killed in Belgium. Christian walks her home and asks to
see her again.
In Vermont, Hope nervously introduces Noah to
her father, having told him beforehand that Noah is Jewish. Mr.
Plowman and Noah walk around the small town, steeped in Puritan tradition,
and as they return to Hope, Mr. Plowman tells Noah that he has never known a
Jew and agrees to their marriage.
In Paris, Christian asks for a transfer as he
dislikes having been assigned to round up children for labor duties and is
beginning to doubt his country's purpose. Hardenburg gives Christian
leave to go to Berlin and asks him to deliver a present to his wife
Gretchen. Gretchen seduces Christian and tells him that she knows
someone on Rommel's staff who can arrange a transfer of duty.
In New York, Michael has been unable to pull any
strings to keep himself out of the army and must report for basic training.
Margaret, who is working for the Office of War Information, is being posted
overseas and wants to get married, but Michael is unwilling.
The next day, Noah leaves Hope to report to the
army. In North Africa, Christian and Hardenburg execute a dawn raid on an
encampment of British soldiers. Hardenburg carries the attack to
excess, and orders all the wounded to be killed, but Christian finds himself
unable to follow that order. Noah and Michael end up in the same army
platoon, where Noah is subjected to harassment by Captain Colclough, who
makes him the scapegoat for the confinement of the entire platoon to the
barracks for a weekend. The other soldiers try to intimidate Noah with
veiled ethnic slurs.
Later, when Noah discovers that money he has
been saving for a birthday present for Hope has been stolen from his
footlocker, he issues a challenge to the unknown thief to fight him, and
when four of the largest men in the platoon admit to the theft, Noah asks
Michael to be his second. When Michael reports to Captain Colclough that
Noah has been badly beaten in three fights and asks him to put a stop to it,
the captain warns Michael that he has been instructed by the colonel to
approve or disapprove a request to have him transferred to Special Services
in London, but should he complain to the colonel about Noah's treatment, the
transfer will not go through. The transfer papers come in, but Michael
elects not to leave as Noah still has one more fight. Noah wins that
one and then goes A.W.O.L.
In North Africa, the German troops are attacked
by British and American forces, but Christian and Hardenburg escape on a
motorcycle. After Christian tells him that he is sick of the "great
German army," Hardenburg replies that he should have shot him earlier when
he disobeyed a command. The motorcycle hits a land mine.
In America, a pregnant Hope visits Noah in army
detention and tells him that a lawyer has indicated to her that if he
returns to his old company, he will not go to prison. Noah goes back
and faces the wrath of Colclough, who fully expects to continue his
persecution of Noah; however, the colonel informs him that he will be
court-martialed for his actions against Noah and Michael. Noah's
fellow soldiers welcome him back and present him with a copy of James
Joyce's Ulysses, which Colclough had confiscated, and inside it, the
money he lost.
Christian, now a captain, visits Hardenburg in a
hospital and finds him with his head totally bandaged. Hardenburg asks
him to visit Gretchen again to reassure her that he is "salvageable."
He also asks Christian to bring him a bayonet with which to kill a fellow
patient, who is beyond hope and wants to die.
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In Berlin, before visiting Gretchen, Christian
witnesses the devastation and misery of the city. Gretchen tells him
that her husband has killed himself with a bayonet, adding that she had
written to him telling him not to return, that he would be better off in a
permanent veterans' hospital. When Gretchen propositions him,
Christian pushes her away in disgust and leaves.
Christian meets Brandt again and they drive back
to Paris to meet Simone and Françoise. Brandt tells Christian that
Germany has lost the war and that he intends to desert. Christian
tells Françoise that the thought of seeing her again kept him going through
the horrors he has witnessed. She urges him to desert but, during the
night, he leaves a farewell note to her, "Forgive me, I love you but I am a
German soldier."
In London, Michael and Margaret are together in
a club during an air raid. Michael has turned down promotions,
choosing to remain a private, but feeling guilt about having Noah and the
others do his fighting for him, decides to return to his old company, now
fighting in Normandy. He tells Margaret they will get married upon his
return.
In Vermont, Hope, now the mother of a baby girl,
receives a letter from Noah promising to return to them.
In Normandy, when they are pinned down by enemy
fire, Noah, with Michael's help, rescues several of the men who had fought
him.
In Germany, when the retreating convoy with
which Christian is now fighting is strafed by a plane, he wanders away and
comes upon the Nackerholtz concentration camp. The camp's commander
complains to him about the difficulties of running such a camp and receives
orders, by phone, to kill every man, woman and child in the camp, 6,000
people, before the American troops arrive. The commandant encourages
Christian to face the enemy when they arrive, doing his duty for the
fatherland, but Christian wanders on very distraught and despairing.
Noah and Michael's company liberate the camp and bring the local mayor to
witness the horror therein. A rabbi, a former prisoner, asks
permission of the company's captain to hold a religious service in the camp,
and the captain guarantees that he can, over the protests of the mayor who
states that this will cause riots. Noah and Michael are walking in the
woods around the camp when the sound of Christian destroying his machine gun
against a tree stump attracts them. As Christian walks toward them,
Michael shoots and kills him. The war ends and Noah returns to New York to
Hope and his daughter. |
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