Charité

Moving, thoughtful and thought provoking. While these events were unfolding in Berlin I was in London and, briefly, a patient in the blacked out and lightly blitzed Children's Hospital, Great Ormand St. Only people of my advanced age , British as well as German, will fully understand what they are seeing. However all the youngsters can enjoy the intelligent script and fine acting.

But the task is well executed. While there is some telescoping of historical events, I have a degree in history and the story line I found to be artistically effective. Acting, pacing and production values exceed expectations. And to disagree with one reviewer, the Russians were barbaric in their ending of the war. If anything, that was downplayed.

On first viewing the promos for this series, I was determined not to watch it, fearing that...like so many German films in recent past...it would be filled with sensationalist and graphic wartime atrocities. When at the urging of a colleague I did give it a chance, I was pleasantly rewarded by its technical brilliance and occasional emotional depth. The medical scenes are nowhere as good as those of British or American hospital soaps, but they are in any case subordinate to a riveting drama framed by actual historical data from World War 2. The main characters are in fact based on real people, and the events more or less accurately in harmony with contemporary events. As usual, subtitles are inferior to dubbing. Simultaneous verbal and visual effects are needed to avoid losing a great deal of dramatic impact. Many subtle or ironic phrases in German go flying right past translation, especially in a rapid fire interchange like many in this story. Another minor fault is that, as in many fictional accounts of the war, too many small gratuitous references and characters from history keep popping up to impede the main narrative. But that in no way diminishes the central theme of ordinary people, non-combatants, coping with the traumatic impact of atrocities occurring all around them. Are there other lessons to be learned from witnessing a sympathetic and righteous population taken over by a cult leader in challenging times? I think so.

Very well made and great character studies. There were some inaccuracies such as the setting started out in the Autumn of 1943 and and there is a discussion about heading to Africa to be with Rommel. The North African campaign was lost by the Germans and over by the Spring of that year. Many medical issues and procedures seem correct for its time, but the one doctor was doing mouth to mouth on a baby and that procedure did not come into practice until the 1950s. Perhaps that was to show the doctor was imaginative and non-conformist. An event where the doctors were treating a hemo-pneumo thorax showed the doctors first interested in removing the metal in the chest, when in fact the priority is on relieving intrathoracic pressure via a chest tube or needle decompression and then stopping bleeding and then vascular and tissue repair. Getting the bullet out is something Hollywood has been hung up on from the beginning. The doctor though, does explain why he wants to look for the metal and remove it, perhaps to appease those that would question it, but the priority was off. Anyway, the show is a must for those interested in history and/or medical shows.

A very good show.

I liked the telling of the beginnings of modern bacteriology. I had Google on the ready, to look up every new name which appeared - they were people who had a huge impact on our world. They are shown with all their faults and failings, as well as their successes.

I was sceptical about the introduction of Arthur Conan Doyle (creator of Sherlock Holmes), which I thought was just a dramatic device, but Google showed it to be factual, and what followed on was also based on fact.

An extremely interesting, and educational (in the good sense of the word) series.