Stars: August Diehl, Dolores Chaplin, Devid Striesow, Karl Markovics, Martin Brambach

Director: Stefan Ruzowitzky

Summary: Set in a Nazi concentration camp, this drama centres on history's biggest counterfeit operation. In THE COUNTERFEITERS, prisoners must choose between aiding the Third Reich in their money-making scheme and their own well-being.

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Not for nothing did Stefan Ruzowitzky’s powerful film The Counterfeiters walk away with the Best Foreign Picture Oscar at the 2008 Academy Awards. And like the previous year’s winner of the prize--the equally superb The Lives Of Others--there are some tough decisions for certain German citizens at the heart of it.

The Counterfeiters, though, is set in West Germany in 1936. It tells the true story of history’s biggest ever counterfeiting operation, set up by the Nazis. The mission? To forge foreign currency. And the king of counterfeiters proves to be Salomon Soroswitch, also known as Sally, who ultimately has to face the dilemma of what to do when he realises that his work is helping to fuel war.

There are so many reasons to commend The Counterfeiters that it’s tricky to know where to start. The cast, for instance, is uniformly excellent, and you could rightly wonder why Oscar overlooked both August Diehl and Karl Markovics for nominations. What’s more, it’s also stunningly, and very intelligently, directed, ratcheting up at times the kind of tension that hundreds of films try and fail to match every year. Married up to a script of three dimensional characters and historical reverence, it’s a quite brilliant package, and one that stays with you long after the credits have rolled.

The Counterfeiters is a very different film to The Lives Of Others, but both expertly reflect the dilemmas that individuals had to face in different parts of Germany, albeit some four or five decades apart. Both are exceptional pieces of cinema, though, and for the purposes of this particular review, The Counterfeiters deserves its Oscar, deserves its worldwide praise, and deserves to be part of your DVD collection. Don’t miss it. --Jon Foster

Aspect Ratio:	16:9 Anamorphic Wide Screen
Main Language:	German
Region:	Region 2
Special Features:	Making Of, Interview with Adolph Burger, Interview with director Stefan Ruzowitzky, Interview with Karl Markovics, Adolph Burger's artefacts, Deleted scenes, Trailer
Subtitles:	English
Year:	2007
Release Date:	March 17, 2008
Runtime:	95 minutes
Certification:
Catalogue Number:	M T D 5363
Keywords:	English, General, Drama, Counterfeiters
Genre:	Drama