Niki Stein
Rommel

There are some principles in which I do not identify myself.

This is true on a purely rational level, which, it must be said, does not always go hand in hand with the emotional one, causing complications and discrepancies that are typical of human nature.

There are, in any case, certain cultural constraints that I define as 'historicized' in the cultural formation of every individual or at least the majority of individuals, leading to the adoption of behaviors based on moral principles resulting from a completely altered view of the world and things.

I think of honor or pride.

The most typical example that comes to mind is the classic one of the Captain of the Titanic.

Edward John Smith.

His responsibilities for the incident that led to the Titanic's collision with an iceberg and the subsequent tragedy are not very clear to me.

In reality, it seems that these are less relevant than how the events have gone down in history.

Even though it is undeniable that in the face of such an event, if there is someone who must assume responsibility for what happened, it was him.

Because that is what the captain's role foresees according to orders of responsibility.

Legend has it that Edward John Smith had an unshakable faith in the unsinkability of the Titanic.

He was a man who believed more in humankind and what humankind had managed to do than in himself.

The legend always represents him standing on the bridge in full uniform while awaiting the inevitable end.

As if to say: better to die being faithful to one's ideas and thoughts than to continue living in the difficult process of questioning all that.

In the end, that's what is most frightening. More than having to assume one's rightful responsibilities for what happened.

This 2012 film by Niki Stein tells the story of the last seven months in the life of General Field Marshal Erwin Johannes Eugen Rommel.

Born in Heidenheim in 1891, Rommel had served in the German army with the rank of lieutenant already during World War I.

But it was during the second conflict that his figure became somehow so significant to make him go down in history.

Distinguished in the Campaign of France in 1940, Rommel was then engaged in Africa where until 1943 he inflicted a series of defeats on British troops earning him the nickname 'Desert Fox'.

Although returning home defeated in 1943, his fame at home and within the army remained virtually unchanged, this also thanks to the propaganda manipulations by Goebbels, who made him one of the heroes, the greatest hero, and soldier of Nazi Germany.

In 1944, in anticipation of what would be the Normandy landing, Adolf Hitler personally gave him the task of commanding the defenses of the Atlantic Wall.

But by then the war was coming to an end.

On the eastern front, Germany was being blocked by the Russians, and Rommel would soon realize the impossibility of defending France from the offensive of the Anglo-American troops, which, after landing, would gain position after position.

At this point, according to the film's reconstructions, Rommel was called upon by a group of conspirators, those who would later take part in the so-called 'Operation Valkyrie' and the assassination attempt on the Fuhrer.

They wanted Rommel's backing and support, whose popularity was such that it could challenge even Hitler's figure to overthrow the Nazi power and negotiate peace with the Anglo-Americans.

Although convinced of the impossibility of winning the war and apparently horrified by the most brutal aspects of the Nazi regime, Rommel considered himself primarily a soldier and a servant of the 'homeland'.

He was also driven by a certain sentiment of revenge after the defeat in North Africa.

These would be the reasons that would restrain him from taking part in the conspiracy. But at the same time, his conscience would prevent him from denouncing the facts to the Fuhrer.

However, after the attack, because of disagreements with Hitler, to whom Rommel had at some point hinted at the inevitable defeat and the need to seek a 'political' solution, he would inevitably be overwhelmed by the course of events and have to pay with his life for being in some way faithful more to himself than to what was an idea of himself.

The film is an impartial reconstruction of events.

The film focuses on Rommel as a general and military man, as remembered by history, who was respected (as well as feared) not only by his men but also by his adversaries.

The portrait that emerges is seemingly positive. That of a man all of a piece and who, even in the face of the evidence, continues to do what he believes to be his duty.

But how much can such a representation truly be positive?

We are talking about a soldier, indeed generally, and while being against war in any case, I will not let my judgment be conditioned by this ideological stance of mine.

The point is to establish to what extent a man must persevere in his convictions or in what may be his aspirations, even when these are evidently more than wrong, somehow harmful.

Primarily for himself.

Besides clashing with the reality of the facts and beyond his 'duty'.

'Rommel' is a historical film. It tells facts and does not intend to judge the general field marshal.

History remembers him in some way still positively, despite being German (therefore Nazi), for his skills in command and being a respected and respectful soldier toward his men and adversaries.

I see him as a man who, in his evident greatness, was still incapable of going beyond this and eventually forced himself to an end according to a 'code' that he himself had elected as his personal faith, but that no one but himself could have truly denied simply because that code was evidently wrong.