Die Brücke

The people who made this awful remake should hide and shame. As a German shortly born after the war I saw the original as a boy and that movie has made a lasting impact on me and I have never ever seen a war movie or shall we say a Anti war movie better than the ORIGINAL "Die Brücke". This remake should be burn and forgotten IT IS AWFUL nd waste of time. Look for the original instead. The remake does not even come close to the time it happens, the feeling is all wrong The love story it total out of place and out of context. Even the language is not the language or use of the language during that period of time. Have you ever seen the original "Die Brücke" you will laugh about this stupid remake.

... consider it an accident and look for the - really impressive - original! You will spare yourself quite a lousy piece of love story and war action rudely looted from the heritage of the 50's version by Bernhard Wicki. Even Hollywood barely could do worse twisting historical facts and life stories into some sort of spectacular fireworks performed by characters who don't really deserve this description. Good war movies (such as the original one!) should include the stories of the human beings involved, narrated in an empathic way thus helping the viewer to understand or at least imagine how it might have come to all the cruelty - and maybe even how it could be overcome. Otherwise there will be sown rather fascination than consternation. The next war will come too soon anyway. 2/10 just because of occasionally good acting (esp. by the soldier boys) and seemingly accurate requisites (uniforms, armory...).

You don't have to know the original to dislike this version of "Die Brücke." It is what its producers wanted it to be: filled with more action and romance than the original, more "modern" (whatever that means), in color and whathaveyounot. What lacks is any sense of reality, any understanding of the time or the people. The romance is unmotivated, that action has no impact at all, and music and slo-mo-shots are overused and abused to imply epic qualities or sadness (passing trucks with wounded German soldiers, dying American tank driver). All in all this looks like a bigger budgeted WWII-film in the vein of the many amateur videos you can see on Youtube, where teenagers dress up in uniforms, wield plastic gun replicas and insert lots of muzzle flash effects over the action scenes.

I did not realise that this was a TV remake of Berhard Wicki's 1959 classic 'Die Brucke' especially as the cover was more misleading than a James Bond movie and the credits stated that the screenplay was based upon a book by Gregor Dorfmeister (Wicki's masterpiece credited a novel by Manfred Gregor). In fact it was a remake of 'Die Bruck' albeit with the additional sub-plots of a sexual nature. I also was impressed with the attention to detail on the equipment employed and care taken with the Production set and design. Whilst it was not quite the work of art displayed by the 1959 version it was acceptable and fairly realistic. Indeed I thought that it was very well made and was to Feature Film standard. I am still working on identifying some of the kit used but it was all believable for the period. Despite the reliance upon Franke Potente as the main international 'Name' in the cast, the casting was very good and all of the characters were believable and did a grand job in telling this sad tale. I do not believe that most fans of this genre will be too disappointed with this well made little tale of the futility of war.

The original Die Brücke could be that much appreciated work of art that the fact alone presents too many demands for any conceivable remake. I however found this one surprisingly good, and it certainly was not as bad as some people have claimed it to have been. Why to make just similar movie again?

Seven poorly trained schoolboys are given a mission to hold out against a strategically important bridge. Germany has a lack of manpower by spring 1945, schoolboys fight alongside with old men: the last remaining reserves of the Reich . And the boys are too young to grasp the hopelessness of the situation, unlike their leader who runs away. Movie doesn't anywhere show that the boys were ever trained, but apparently they have some basic training because they can assemble and use several weapons and they can move under cover.

Seven schoolboys hold out against seasoned American troops? Given that they have a good position with effective weaponry (plus the suggested basic training), and the American commander does not want to fight against children, they possibly could even make it. Weapon freaks will notice hereby a plentiness of rarely seen ww2 equipment, save for the one tank whose type I didn't recognize. Some effects are rather lame too, but I have seen worse and have still forgiven them. I give a relatively high rating because I didn't suffer as much watching it than these boys depicted.