DVD Review: The Counterfeiters

For the second year in a row, Germany produced the Best Foreign Language winner at the Oscars, and like last year's The Lives Of Others, The Counterfeiters is a politically charged thriller about uncomfortable events in the country's past.

This is a wartime tale, focusing on the uneasy relationship between the Nazis and Jewish counterfeiters, who were offered a slightly nicer life in concentration camps in return for creating fraudulent money and documents. It hits DVD this week.

With the exception of the good-natured larking around in The Great Escape, concentration camp movies obviously tend to be pretty grim affairs. The Counterfeiters isn't exactly a laugh-riot, but writer/director Stefan Ruzowitzky makes the wise decision to place the emphasis on thrills rather than gruelling drama.

At the centre of the film is the moral issues that the counterfeiters – especially a master forger called Sorowitsch – face. By accepting nicer living conditions in return for helping their enemies' cause, are they giving in too easily to their oppressors? It is to Ruzowitzky's credit that he sees both sides of the argument, and although they are very much the good guys, the Jewish characters are written with impressive depth and ambiguity.

The Counterfeiters is not however without flaws. Ruzowitzky makes use of the second-most irritating device in cinema – the modern day bookend. Featured equally annoyingly in the likes of Saving Private Ryan and Titanic, this framing device is second only to the voiceover narration and as usual signifies that the director has no idea how to end his film.

And given how good the Jewish characters are, it's a little disappointing that the Nazis are all one-dimensional villains. Not that you'd expect them to be a fun-loving bunch of goosestepping pranksters, but they do feel like they've wandered in from a lesser, less morally complex movie.

Nevertheless, The Counterfeiters shines a light on a fascinating and little-known episode from recent history. It might not be the best foreign-language film of the last 12 months, but it is a good one.