How dark and deadly can WWII Germany get? Discover Robert Schwentke's THE CAPTAIN

Antiheroes don't come much more non-heroic than the young German army deserter who goes by the  name of Willi Herold, and who -- thanks to the discovery of a abandoned jeep, a uniform and some food --  is soon impersonating a German Captain and getting up to some really awful stuff.

Herr Herold actually existed, and even if the movie made about him -- entitled THE CAPTAIN and just having its U.S. theatrical debut -- is fictionalized, this young man's short but shocking military career should astound and depress you, big-time.

The film's writer/director, Robert Schwentke (shown at left) has had a varied career, including both German and American films (from Flight Plan and RED to the Insurgent/Allegiant duo), but nothing he's done that I've seen would have prepared us for the bleak and nasty ugliness of this intimate little World War II epic. What young Herold does and how he manages it might defy credibility were the history of WWII not already so crammed with shock and unbelievable horror. As played by Max Hubacher (shown below), a young actor whose career seems to have been set in major


motion by this role and film, Herold remains as fascinating and mystifying as he is a cipher. We know nothing about him prior to his desertion (except a couple of platitudes his daddy told him). Though he initially seems like someone we might root for as he runs away from the German military police whose aim is clearly to kill him, once his escape is made and his disguise in place, he slowly becomes more and more horrific. All of which makes this young man's single scene of what seems like "feeling" (shown in the penultimate photo below) all the more bizarre.

Yet it takes much more than a single man -- even a high-level military officer -- to achieve what  is accomplished here. How Herold is helped along, and by whom, is what makes the movie even darker and more disgusting.

The apex/nadir is reached in a lengthy celebratory dinner honoring this "officer" and his work, with food and alcohol aplenty and even a pair of Jewish comedians to entertain the troops with ugly jokes. How those whom one might call "good" Germans are coerced into helping the horror is effectively demonstrated, and this landmark scene ends by offering up the single way out, when one is forced to enable this kind of evil.

As effective as is young Hubacher, the excellent supporting cast proves even better, with Milan Peschel (above and below, left) the standout, as the infantryman who initially helps Herold, only to grow increasingly aghast at (and a reluctant party to) his actions.

During the films final half hour, it grows nearly (and rightly) surreal, as this war must have seems for so many people. As director, Schwentke gets much not merely "right" but on-the-nose, though I wish he had done away with a few unnecessary artsy/fartsy overhead shots and that single moment when the excellent black-and-white cinematography (by the excellent Florian Ballhaus) must change to color in order to make a point that has already been made via the script.

Otherwise, The Captain is strong, hideous stuff. Gird up your loins and prepare. The movie will make you glad all over again that Germany and Hitler lost their war and should have you hopeful that Donald Trump and the Republican Party will lose theirs against America. We shall see.

Meanwhile, this Music Box Films release, running just under two hours and spoken in German with English subtitles, opens tomorrow, Friday, July 27, in New York City at the Quad Cinema, in Chicago at the Music Box Theater on August 3, and in Los Angeles at the Landmark NuArt on August 10 -- before expanding to another dozen or so theaters over the weeks/months to come. To view all currently scheduled playdates, cities and theaters, click here and then scroll down to click on THEATERS.

Childhood sexual abuse meets the cult of American macho in Travis Mathews' DISCREET

Possibly as dark, dismal and depressing a movie as you are likely to encounter, DISCREET, the new film from Travis Mathews (writer and co-director of Interior. Leather Bar.) is also worth seeing for a number of reasons -- starting with the fact of its remarkable subtlety. 

Mr. Mathews (shown at right) doesn't slap us in the face with anything. And considering the subjects he's dealing with -- childhood sexual abuse, revenge, murder, suicide, prostitution, group sex in blindfolds, and homosexualty trying its damndest to disguise itself as the activity of really macho men -- this is quite a feat. Instead, Mathews parcels out his information via visuals and sounds, memories and current activity that come to us in small, oblique shards that we must piece together.

Piece them we do. And, boy, is the finished product ugly. 

The movie's non-hero, Alex (played in properly dark, if one-note fashion by Jonny Mars, above), is carrying around a load of traumatic memory. Instead of trying to work this out via more usual routes -- a therapist, perhaps -- he has taken to arranging oddball group sex sessions between men (below), while simultaneously stealing their money;

hiring a young man to do who-knows-what with the very fellow, now old and infirm (Bob Swaffar, at left, below), who molested Alex in his younger days; fellating and/or jacking off a local wealthy Hispanic man in his sauna (João Federici, shown at left, two photos down); and then onwards to actions that are much, much worse.

The breadth (if not the depth) of the despicable goings-on here is near breathtaking, and yet Mathews gives it to us as though these were merely every-day events. (Perhaps, for those engaging in them, they are.) This makes it seem all the more awful. Intercut with the degradation is the interesting web site of a young and pretty Asian woman with whom Alex seems to want to connect.

Yet despite this tiny morsel of hope, along with the attempt of Alex's mother to share her son's life in some small way, our boy is dead set on a course of major destruction. Throughout, the filmmaker never strays from his oblique style, dark content and refusal to provide us with one bit of the usual positive spin. The result is one of the more unnerving, queasy-making movies in recent memory. And yet, due to Mathews' subtle, indirect approach, TrustMovies does not remember a single moment of overt violence, blood nor gore to be seen. Yet all of this is present, somehow, via the unspoken "threat."

Discreet opens this Friday, June 1, in Los Angeles at Laemmle's Music Hall 3 and simultaneously will be available via VOD. The movie is certainly worth a look -- if you're ready for something strange and about as far from feel-good as you can imagine.

Damien Power's crackerjack -- but extremely ugly -- survival thriller, KILLING GROUND

As much as I am in awe of KILLING GROUND -- which is the best film of this particular sub-genre (lovers-go-camping-and must-suddenly-fight-for-their lives) that TrustMovies has yet seen -- I am somewhat loathe to recommend it unless I also say that, as frightening and thrilling as it is, it's also one of the most matter-of-fact ugly movies I have ever seen. Now, it is nowhere near the bloodiest nor goriest of this genre. In fact, there is about as little of all that as could be imagined, considering what happens here.

And yet in this, his first full-length film after a slew of shorts, writer/director Damien Power (shown at left) has managed to get just about everything right. This would include the ability to engage us with his characters (all of them, good and evil); build suspense and atmosphere in equally deft, quick strokes; rouse simply superb performances from everyone on screen (including a near-infant and a dog); and then, once the tension he's created has reached its peak and the plot's "explosion" has occurred, see to it that we're practically unable to take a breath until those final credits start to roll. The filmmaker even manages to lay out his tale using past and present in a way that keeps us unnerved and guessing until that aforementioned explosion of violence takes place, making inevitable all that follows.

The movie of which Killing Ground may most remind you would be Eden Lake, the James Watkins 2008 survival thriller starring Kelly Reilly and Michael Fassbender. This one is even better, more sophisticated in both its construction and execution, and equally unnerving and thrilling. Also, the filmmaker thankfully refrains from making us view a lot of the horror that happens. This will displease torture-porn connoisseurs. Yet the scenario itself is so full of irredeemable ugliness that I can't imagine anyone accusing Mr. Power of being too prissy.

Our lead characters are a couple who is, from the sound of things, thinking about getting hitched fairly soon. He (the fine Ian Meadows, above) is a doctor, and she (an even better Harriet Dyer, below) is -- hmmm... I am not even sure I know or remember what occupation she has (other than trying to stay alive). They arrive at their camping destination to discover another tent pitched ahead of theirs. Yet no one is in it, so the couple expects to see and meet their "neighbors" fairly soon.

The villains of the piece are two men (Aaron Pedersen, below, right, and Aaron Glenane, below, left) who are revealed along the way as Outback psychopaths (the setting here is Australia). Their behavior grows crazier as the movie rolls along, but that behavior also cannot be discounted because, as nutty as it gets, it still unfortunately seems to fit these truly frightening and unpredictable characters all too well.

While our hero and heroine would seem no match for these two men, the latter's very oddness and plentiful kinks play into what happens and why. There is another entire set of characters, too, and these -- a father, his relatively new bride, their barely out of infancy child, and his daughter (Tiarnie Coupland, below) from an earlier marriage -- bring the past into the present, while giving the movie its ugliest charge.

That's it for plot, so as not to provide any more spoilers. The film, by the way, is highly feminist -- in its own non-showy way. So if you're partial to suspense, creeping dread, and edge-of-your-seat thrills, you could hardly do better than Killing Ground. But, yikes: You've been warned.

From IFC Midnight and running a sleek 88 minutes, the movie opens this Friday, July 21, in New York City at the IFC Center, and in Los Angeles at the Arena Cinelounge Sunset. If you're near neither city, despair not: The movie simultaneously hits VOD nationwide.