All language subtitles for 01 Apocalypse The Fall Of Hitler 2023

In the valley of the Bavarian Alps,
January 1943,

Eva Braun has herself filmed for the
pleasure of her secret love, Adolf Hitler.

Is the twilight of the gods
by his favorite composer Wagner,

which he often listens to in his
mountain home, perhaps an omen?

For her, he is the Fuhrer, the leader who
has conquered Europe and part of Russia,

despite setbacks in Moscow and
Stalingrad, where the situation is dire.

Will his need to dominate, still as
strong as ever, lead to his own downfall?

APOCALYPSE
THE FALL OF HITLER

After these first defeats,
Hitler prepares for the great shock.

1/2
GREAT SHOCK

January 43, an icy winter.

At the Wolf's Lair, the Fuhrer's
headquarters close to the Russian front.

Hitler prepares with Marshal Kettel,
head of the army's high command,

and Ribbentrop, minister of foreign
affairs, for the arrival of his ally,

Romania's dictator,
Marshal Antonescu.

Hitler blames him for the Romanian
army's debacle at Stalingrad,

which, according to him, has led to
the inevitable fate of Germany's 6th Army.

In Hitler's entourage, one of his
liaison officers, Nikolaus von Below,

notes in his memoirs: "The longer
the fighting in Russia went on,

the more unrestrained became
his hatred of the Jews."

Hitler constantly insists:

"Exterminating the Jews
is my mission on Earth."

Behind these doors, one of the
secretaries, Christa Schroeder, notes:

"When during conferences,
the conversation

turned to rumors about
the mass murderers and torture,

in front of witnesses,
Hitler would have never admitted

the inhumane harshness
of the orders he had given."

But what does his secretary really
know about the roundups, ghettos,

deportations, massacres, about
all these extermination operations

constantly carried out in
Russia and occupied Europe?

And how much does
Eva Braun really know?

She says:
"I met people who told me stories."

"I couldn't believe my ears."

"But in the end, isn't it better
that I don't know what's going on?"

"After all, I can't change anything."

Berlin, March 21st, 1943.

Hitler inaugurates an exhibition
of weapons seized from the Soviets

to cover up the fall of Stalingrad.

He is greeted by Marshal Goering,
Minister of Aviation,

with whom he seized power
exactly 10 years earlier.

The atmosphere has changed. An
attack is being prepared against him.

It is unsuccessful, but others will
follow. He miraculously escapes them all.

Throughout Hitler-occupied Europe,
1943 marks the true rise

of the resistance to Nazism,
even in Germany.

Hans Scholl, a medical student drafted
as a nurse on the Eastern Front,

speaks of the horrors committed
by the Wehrmacht in Russia.

Together with his sister Sophie
Scholl, and another medical student,

Alexander Schmorell,
they launch the White Rose Movement.

They denounce what they call
"The dictatorship of evil".

And hand out anti-Nazi leaflets.

Here's one. It ends as follows.

"Our people stand against the annihilation
of Europe by national socialism

in a renewed affirmation of freedom."

They are turned in, arrested,
and sentenced to death.

Sophie Scholl declares:
"What we have said and written,

many people feel the same,
but they don't dare express it."

She is guillotined at the age of 20.

Sieg Heil! Sieg Heil"

Hitler now faces a wall.

At the Casablanca Conference, the Allies
have just confirmed their intention

to continue the fight until
Germany surrenders unconditionally.

So Hitler declares: "As I have
always said, the situation is clear."

"It will be victory or destruction."

His accomplice, Goebbels, Minister
of Propaganda, had prepared the field.

Do you want total war?

German people, rise up!

Storm! Unleash yourself!

The apotheosis is April 19th, 1943,
the day before the Fuhrer's birthday.

With Beethoven's Ninth Symphony,
Ode to Joy,

under the direction of a pro-Nazi
conductor, Herbert von Karajan.

His secretary,
Christa Schroeder writes:

"Hitler appeared less and less in
public as his army suffered setbacks."

"Like a reptile that fears
the sun, Hitler fled the light."

German losses now exceeded
4 million military

and civilian dead,
wounded, or missing.

Christa Schroeder writes about
Hitler's diabolical nature:

"The death of a human being left
him absolutely indifferent."

"He viewed humanity as a long chain of
men, and he himself as the first link."

The next day, April 20th, in the Berghof,
his residence in the Bavarian Alps,

Hitler celebrates his birthday
with a small group. He is 54.

His personal photographer, Hoffman,
presents a collection of photos

ordered by the Fuhrer.

Monuments of the great German Reich, which
will disappear in the Allied bombings,

so they can be rebuilt
identically after the war.

Hoffman has him admire paintings stolen
from the Jews for his personal collection.

His close circle poses for
the traditional family photo.

In the front row,
to the Fuhrer's right, is Eva Braun.

She has gone from secret
mistress to official companion.

He receives birthday wishes from
the staff and their children.

One of the secretaries,
Traudl Junge, writes:

"He only talks about his dog as
if it were the dog's birthday."

He says: "She really is the cleverest dog
I know, and I often play ball with her."

Hitler talks about his dog
to avoid talking about the war.

The war continues,
like here in northern Russia,

where the goal is now holding on over
advancing and surviving over winning.

The war continues over a 1900-mile
front, from Lapland to Crimea.

Kharkiv is taken
and retaken four times.

Hitler, filmed by Eva Braun,
still seems cheerful and confident.

This is not just the comedy of power.

If he doesn't talk about the war,
it's because he now believes

he has the means to win, with what
he calls "His secret weapons".

Thanks to this man, Wernher von Braun,
a young genius at the service of evil,

who has designed an invincible
weapon, the V-2 rocket.

He has it built on
an island in northern Germany.

When the V-2 is perfected and
produced in large quantities,

it will be able to transport
a ton of explosives over London,

and later over New York,

and one day maybe
even the atomic bomb.

A small team of nuclear
scientists are working on it,

but the best ones were forced to flee
Germany because they were Jewish.

The first trials are
far from conclusive.

While he waits for his secret weapons,
Hitler still has a key advantage.

In the Berghoff's grandiose living room,
Hitler welcomes Admiral Karl Dönitz,

the strategist of submarine warfare

whom he has just named
commander-in-chief of the German navy.

Since the beginning of the conflict, German
submariners, most of them die-hard Nazis,

have sunk by torpedo or cannon 17 million
tons of ships, liners, oil tankers,

transports of troops, equipment,
food, and wounded soldiers.

An unconscionable war.

After prowling the ocean, Dönitz's
gray wolves, the famous U-boats,

hide from Allied aircraft.

They return to their impenetrable
shelters on the French coast,

in Lorient, Bordeaux, and Royan.

They are the heroes of the day,
dead the next.

27,000 out of 35,000
submariners killed.

70% losses,
including Admiral Dönitz's son.

In 1943, Hitler sees his
project to conquer Caucasic

and Middle Eastern oil escape him.

But he still occupies part of
Russia and what he calls New Europe.

German propaganda continues
to celebrate Hitler's idea

of a unified Europe
fighting against Bolshevism.

For those living under
the Wehrmacht's control,

like the family of photographer
Fernand Bignon in Normandy,

life can be peaceful if you are neither
a Jew nor an enemy of the Reich,

a communist, or a resistance fighter.

There are many resistance fighters willing
to risk being packed into freight cars

that transport refugees,
like this one,

which are also used to deport
unfortunate Jews to the death camps.

There's a real risk of being turned in by
a neighbor while listening to Radio London,

the Free French Forces,
or personal messages.

General de Gaulle's voice gives hope.

The country is not dead. Hope is
not vanquished. Long live France.

The majority of
the French go with the flow.

They live through the German
occupation with one main concern,

not starving to death.

The French call the Germans
les doryphores, or potato bugs,

harmful insects that
devour potato crops.

The French cycle across the country.
There's not a drop of gasoline left.

Ration cards provide meager servings.

So people search for a farmer
who can sell meat, eggs, and milk.

They pick watercress in the rivers

and rabbit grass
for their small family farm.

A spiteful caption, no ration card,
and yet, rabbit in mustard sauce.

Mr. Bignon films his daughters, who
have become accustomed to wooden shoes

and everything the Germans call ersatz,
like fish fat instead of butter.

Because Hitler's Reich is also
subject to severe restrictions,

now the German women produce shells heavier
than their weight for Goebbels' total war

that's burning through ammunition.

But German rationing seems to spare some,
as evidenced by these amateur images

from the spring of 1943, filmed in the
touristic town of Dachau, near Munich.

Dachau is also the first
Nazi concentration camp,

opened only two months after
Hitler rose to power in 1933.

200,000 deportees pass through this
gate that reads: "Work sets you free".

Communists, homosexuals, Bavarian
Jews, gypsies, Polish priests,

many of whom are slaves
of the BMW company.

They will die of hunger,
medical experiments,

or under the blows of the SS guards
that we see here playing volleyball

next to the camp on Sundays.

Dachau is a medieval city that
this club of amateur photographers

and filmmakers has
chosen as a subject.

They're welcomed by one of
the SS officers, hanged in 1946,

like the entire camp staff.

It's a feast, courtesy of
the Dachau guards' canteen.

These people are Nazis, otherwise they
would be rationed like everyone else.

For these privileged members
of the regime, Adolf, the Fuhrer,

is always right,
and he will win the war.

On April 14, 1943, Hitler makes
Mussolini come to Germany.

His features are drawn,
and his power is wavering.

Hitler wants to inform him he plans
to resume the offensive in Russia.

He still needs Mussolini's
support and his soldiers.

The Italian dictator is reluctant. He would
prefer an effort in the Mediterranean,

where his interests
are directly threatened.

But Hitler shows him that his
generals prefer to attack in Russia

to stabilize his front
and reassure their allies.

This will be Operation Citadel,

an offensive in the center of the front,
in the sector of the city of Kursk,

where the Russians
had managed to advance.

The Germans will attack from the north
and south with their usual pincer maneuver.

Will the world's fate in July 1943
be a battle around the city of Kursk?

Hitler mobilizes the energy of Speer,
his architect,

whom he names Minister of Armaments.

Speer gives a new boost
to the German war industry.

He has succeeded by working millions
of prisoners and deportees to death.

He forces the steel industry of
occupied Europe to work at full capacity

to produce weapons in mass quantity.

Hitler and Speer have also found
a genius engineer, Ferdinand Porsche.

For Hitler, Porsche had invented
the people's car, the Volkswagen.

Hitler and Speer make him design
a better tank than the Soviet T-34.

Speer attends the trials
of this Tiger tank.

The gamble pays off.
It is a 60-ton monster

armed with the famous
88-millimeter cannons,

capable of piercing all types of
armor, more precise, more range.

They will spearhead the largest
group of tanks ever seen.

Who can possibly defeat
Ferdinand Porsche's Tiger?

At the end of June 1943, everything
is ready for Operation Citadel.

Hitler has gathered 2,700 tanks,
7,000 guns,

2,600 planes, and 800,000 soldiers.

A massive effort, considering the Wehrmacht's
substantial human and material losses.

Hitler says: "The victory at Kursk
will be a signal to the entire globe."

"The path to world
domination is clear."

But the Germans have once again
underestimated their enemy.

The Red Army lines up twice as many
tanks, 5,600, along with 30,000 guns,

3,600 aircraft,

and nearly 2 million soldiers.

Stalin rallies them.
He has his proclamation read:

"Do not leave a single meter
of our land to the enemy."

"Be ready for the decisive fight
against the Germano-fascist invaders."

Thanks to its spies,
Soviet high command knows precisely

that the enemy will strike in Kursk.

Nikita Khrushchev,
who will one day be Russia's leader,

plays a role in this battle.

He is a political commissar,
Stalin's eye.

He oversees everything.
In his memoir, he recounts

that he interrogated SS prisoners
before having them shot

and knows what is being
prepared and what is at stake.

He says: "The next two or
three days will be terrible."

"Either we hold out or
the Germans take Kursk."

"They're staking everything on this one
strike. It is a matter of life or death."

"We must see to it that
they break their necks."

Khrushchev, in his American
coveralls, climbs into his Jeep,

supplied by the Americans, as are
two-thirds of the vehicles, planes, weapons,

and all the canned goods
that his army eats.

July 4, 1943.

The Soviet infantrymen
in the trenches are Ukrainians.

Like every soldier around the world,
they speak of their wives

and girlfriends before battle.

Their general, Konstantin Rokossovsky,
had just been warned by Stalin himself

that the German assault
will take place at night.

Across the front lines,
the Russians wait.

They rode on their tanks.
For the fatherland. For Stalin.

In a short trip to the mountains,
Hitler is photographed at the Berkhof,

looking very relaxed.

At his side, Goebbels informs him:

"The Russians are running
out of human reserves."

Goebbels comes to encourage
Nazi General Walter Model,

from whom defeat is not an option.

His soldier's honor is at stake.

Model, under the orders of Field Marshal
von Kluge, must attack from the north,

starting from Morel.

And Manstein will attack from the south
to encircle the Russians around Kursk.

Marshal von Manstein has his doubts.

He believes Hitler has waited
too long to launch his offensives

and has allowed the Russians
to reinforce their troops.

Manstein wants more soldiers,
younger and younger.

But on this 4th of July,
the die is cast.

The greatest tank battle
of all time is about to begin.

Hitler proclaims:
"Soldiers of the Reich,

today you are taking part in an
offensive of the utmost importance."

"The outcome of this offensive may
affect the outcome of the war."

"Your victory will show the whole
world that to resist us is futile."

The German attack order is confirmed.

In the north and the south,
on July 5th at 4 a.m.,

the Wehrmacht will
launch its offensives.

But General Rokossovsky's
troops make the first move.

At 2 a.m., they unleash their
artillery and Katyusha rockets.

And yet the Russian fire
is largely ineffective.

And the Germans attack, backed
by their tanks, their assault weapons,

with their Tigers leading the way.

The powerful Russian tanks,
the T-34s, are quick to retaliate.

The battle is reminiscent of World
War I, says Nazi writer Paul Carell.

Despite the tanks, it's a stalemate.

Paul Carell writes: "All the officers
are dead or wounded, in vain."

"The men rush to conquer a trench."

"Another trench immediately
blocks their way."

"Battalions are melting like wax."

On July 10th, north of Kursk,
after five days of progress,

the Germans are stopped by
the violence of the Russian defense.

Two days later, General Model orders
a retreat to the starting positions.

While retreating, Lieutenant Karl
Freigang of the 7th Infantry Division

angrily destroys everything
that could be used by the enemy.

He writes: "We must go back."

"All these victims died for nothing.
All this commitment was in vain."

"I have wept tears
of anger and sadness."

While Model retreats in the north,
the SS manages to break

through the second line of Russian defenses
in the south, but with heavy losses.

They take many prisoners
who were sent behind the lines

to the summer wheat fields.

The Luftwaffe, Germany's air force,
attacks the last line of Russian defense.

The famous Stuka dive bombers
pound Soviet positions.

The Battle of Kursk
is also a great air battle.

The Soviets now have better planes,

but are lacking in good
pilots and effective tactics.

They suffer huge losses.

On Yakovlev fighters, the Yak-3s,

the French volunteers of the Normandy squadron
join the fight alongside the Russians.

Now called the Normandie-Niemen
Regiment, at the end of the war

they will tally
273 victories and 38 dead,

including their commander, Major Jean
Tulasne, killed in the sky over Kursk.

On the southern front,
the land battle reaches its climax.

But in the violent fighting,
neither side gains the upper hand,

and the worst is yet to come.

All German armored forces launch
an assault on the Russian T-34s.

On July 12, 1943, eight days after
the start of Operation Citadel,

3,000 tanks go head-on
in hellacious chaos.

This is Soviet tank commander
Yevgeny Shkurdalov's first battle.

"I hit the first German
tank at 100 meters."

"This Tiger has already
demolished many of our tanks."

"It is firing in our direction.
I aim. I shoot."

"The Tiger catches fire. I've
never felt such excitement before."

German tank driver
Wilhelm Heinz says:

"T-34 straight ahead. The shells
are frantically passed to me."

"I load them into the gun, and the
captain keeps shouting: "Shoot, shoot!"."

"The Russians keep getting closer.
After the fourth shot, the T-34 stops."

"It has five centimeter
holes in its flank."

Russian commander Pavel Rotmistrov
recalls a hellish vision:

"The battlefield is overrun
by swirls of smoke and dust."

"The earth is shaken
with explosions."

"Tanks collide with each
other and get stuck."

"They can't back up."

"They fight to the death,
shooting until they're blown to bits

and in flames."

Tanks fire at each
other at close range.

Some of them end up colliding
or rolling on top of one another.

2,100 Russian tanks are destroyed
compared to 360 German ones.

A clear-cut victory.

A sea of wreckage,
scrap metal, and human debris.

1.2 million Soviets and 200,000
Germans have been killed or wounded.

The famous SS General Sepp Dietrich,
so close to Hitler, tells his officers:

"Tonight we shall dine in Kursk."

And yet, to everyone's surprise,
Hitler, smiling, summons his generals.

He orders them to stop fighting
and return to their starting positions,

not to take Kursk.

So close to the goal, General
Sepp Dietrich does not understand.

Stalin takes the opportunity to
show the world the Kursk victory,

which isn't one to recover lost
ground and retake the city of Orjol.

Stalin institutes the salvo of
cannons to celebrate each victory.

He will fire 355 of them
by the end of the war.

Hitler wavers.

He is facing another Russian
offensive in Ukraine, near Donetsk,

as well as the Allied
invasion of Sicily,

which threatens Italy
and southern Germany.

For Hitler, the danger is so serious

that he takes the risk of flying to northern
Italy to meet his longtime ally, Mussolini.

A unique photo shows
Il Duce looking anxious,

begging the Fuhrer
to find a way out of the war.

Hitler tries to reassure him with an
insane monologue about his secret weapons

and new submarines.

Roughly 100 large, ocean-ready
submarines are under construction.

Much more powerful, they will be
able to stay underwater much longer.

They will be armed with
acoustic torpedoes.

English Admiral Cunningham warns:

"With these, they will shoot at our
freighters like ducks on a pond."

Churchill writes in his memoirs:

"This whole war depends
on the battle of the Atlantic."

And he adds: "The only thing that really
frightens me are the German submarines."

Most submarines are built in the port
of Hamburg, Germany's second largest city.

This is where Churchill and the Allied
Air Force commanders want to strike,

at the very heart of Nazi
submarine production.

For months,
the British and the Americans develop

what will become the first major
city bombing campaign in history.

Each plane will carry a carefully measured
mixture of explosive and incendiary bombs.

The logic of war leads to this terrible
undertaking, patiently calculated

and perfected to produce
maximum devastation.

The shipyards aren't
the only targets.

Everything must be destroyed, the port
with its installations and factories,

and the city around it with
its workers and inhabitants,

anything that could
serve Hitler's Reich.

On July 25th, 1943,
the British and the Americans

launch 1,000 four-engine
bombers over Germany.

Their target is Hamburg.

This armada spreads
across six miles of sky.

The bombers take
turns for eight days.

These young crews sacrifice
themselves to accomplish

this deadly mission against
the German population.

A hurricane of fire instantly kills 40,000
people and renders 600,000 homeless.

The man who organized this terrifying
raid is General Arthur Harris.

He writes: "The Nazis entered this
war under the rather childish delusion

that they were going to bomb everyone
else and nobody was going to bomb them."

"In Rotterdam, London, Warsaw,
and half a hundred other places,

they sowed the wind and now they're
going to reap the whirlwind."

Seven more air raids follow on
Hamburg, dumping 8,000 tons of bombs

without destroying the shipyards.

The German people have now been
plunged into the misery of war.

But Goebbels' first objective is to
show that Hitler is firmly in control.

He has Hitler filmed in his
headquarters at the Wolf's Lair.

The Führer seems serene,
but the military situation in Russia

is deteriorating a bit more each day.

Hitler must go to Russia
to meet with Marshal von Manstein,

who commands the Southern
Front in Ukraine.

The meeting is heated. Manstein says:

"I want to emphasize the
gravity of our situation."

"Whether we like it or not, we should be
compelled to retreat behind the Dnieper."

"The Big Dnieper River is
the objective of the Russian offensive

from Kursk towards
Smolensk and Kiev."

Hitler authorizes the retreat
and like Napoleon and Stalin,

gives a scorched earth order.

The great Russian writer Vasily Grossman
testifies to the Nazis' savagery:

"I visited the beautiful
fertile Dnieper Valley,

transformed by the fascists into
a hell of suffering and torture."

"Fascism shoots and kills people,
not individually,

but by entire villages and cities."

"Flamethrowers and machine
guns with incendiary bullets

burn dozens of flourishing villages, demolish
streets, neighborhoods, whole towns."

This is what the soldiers of
the Red Army discover in their reconquest.

Revenge is immediate.

The Stalinists also want
to regain control of the people

after two years of German occupation.

They organize large demonstrations and try
those who have sympathized with the enemy.

All the trials end in execution
or deportation to the GULAGs.

On the German side, Marshal von
Manstein returns to the Wolf's Lair

to ask the Fuhrer to stop
handling military affairs.

Hitler is furious, but he agrees
to step down from military command.

He continues to chair meetings,
but his mood is progressively dark.

His favorite secretary,
Christa Schroeder, says:

"He played with his dog,
a gift from Bormann."

"He ate his meals alone,
and he verbatis to talk about the war."

Yet Hitler bounces back. He gives
SS officer Otto Skorzeny a mission.

He must save Mussolini, arrested
by the new Italian authorities

who have asked the Anglo-American
allies for an armistice.

Mussolini is imprisoned, but where?
Skorzeny must find him.

Meanwhile,
German paratroopers invade Rome.

The Italian army is
disarmed and deported.

Skorzeny ultimately finds
Mussolini locked up north of Rome

in this mountain hotel
that looks like a fortress.

On September 12th, 1943,
the German paratroopers

and the SS land on the
mountain in a glider.

There is no reaction from the
Italians. They free Mussolini,

who says to Skorzeny: "It was time,
I was going to commit suicide."

In the various planes taking him
to Germany, Mussolini explains

that the Italian armistice included
him being turned over to the allies.

But when he is brought to Hitler, he
understands that his fate will be no better.

Hitler wants this exhausted, defeated
man to still be of use to him.

He pushes him to create
a counter-government in northern Italy,

now occupied by the Germans.

Hitler and the Nazis,
smiling for the camera,

send Mussolini back to
Italy to an uncertain fate.

Hitler's is hardly more reassuring.

His worst enemies are gathered for the
first time in front of the world's press.

All eyes are on them.
First, Russia's leader,

Stalin, Marshal of the Red Army.

In pride of place, the President of
the United States, Franklin D. Roosevelt.

And Churchill, in his distinguished
Royal Air Force uniform,

who embodies
the resistance to Nazism.

The day's agenda is devoted to
the date of the Allied landing in France.

It will take place
in the spring of 1944.

The second front, long awaited
by the Russians, can finally open.

Stalin has no doubt about
the outcome of the war.

He declares: "After the victory

we will have to shoot all
German officers 50,000."

Churchill, horrified, replies: "I prefer to
be shot than to sully my country's honour."

Roosevelt to lighten the mood, jokes:

"Maybe we could stop at 49,000?"

For the first time since
the beginning of the war,

Hitler spends Christmas alone
in his bunker on his cot.

He wants to show his solidarity
with his soldiers on the front.

And what of Eva Braun?

One of the bodyguards,
Rochus Misch, recalls:

"As soon as Hitler left, Eva Braun
threw a party in no time at all."

"Her expression had changed.
She had become funny and playful."

"She seemed to open up to say that we
should take advantage of this departure,

of this moment of freedom,
that we should all get to it."

The Germans begin
the New Year by digging shelters.

Their spirits are high because
they still believe in victory.

Hitler says: "Germany will rise from
its ashes more beautyful then ever."

In February 1944, American psychoanalyst
Walter Langer studies the case of the Fuhrer.

He writes: "Hitler will
avoid public appearances."

"There will be a plot against him."

"He will not accept peace negotiations
and he will refuse to surrender."

"He will take revenge
on the world for hating him

and he will ultimately
commit suicide."

Transcription: danel32
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