This drama takes place in 1990, shortly after the demolition of the Berlin wall had begun. This was a time when a young Norwegian lawyer felt that there was a good chance of winning a lawsuit against the Norwegian Government for reparations for the children of the Nazi Lebensborn program. Begun in 1935 the goal of the Lebensborn program was to produce more Aryan children for the Third Reich, mainly by way of Nazi leaders producing plentiful offspring. The program was expanded to occupied countries whereby Nazis would mate with with local unmarried women with many, but not all, of the offspring brought back to Germany. The story unfolded in a way to keep my interest. On the one hand Katrine, the main character, is seen as the wife of a Norwegian submarine captain--part of a close, happy family. But early on she is seen on a flight out of the country where she completely transforms her appearance. At that point I was hooked to find out what her story was and I appreciated the slow reveal leading to some intensely dramatic scenes. The story is complicated enough to make it hard to describe without revealing plot details.I had never heard of the Nazi Lebensborn program and this movie shows how focusing on personal experiences can explicate history in a more attention grabbing way than reading a history book. I wish there had been more explanation of the basis for the lawsuit against the Norwegian government. A little research on the topic explains how shabbily, and even cruelly, the Lebensborn children were treated, with the assent of the Norwegian government.All the actors are in fine form--it's good to see that age is not keeping Liv Ullman off the screen.

You can read summaries of this movie's plot line elsewhere. This movie is all about Juliane Kohler's heart-searing portrayal of a woman coming to terms with her past. For me, five stars on Netflix, ten stars on IMDb.Some have written that the plot is implausible. It is not. It is fascinating. I had never before heard of Juliane Kohler until coming across this movie on Netflix, but I now expect to see everything I can find with her. She is absolutely riveting. Her astonishingly expressive face is the centerpoint of every scene. In fact, at nearly fifty years of age, she is more beautiful than photos I have seen of her in movies ten and twenty years earlier.Too, Liv Ullman is wonderful as her mother. I haven't see Ms. Ullman since her films with Ingmar Bergman in the late 50's and 60's, followed by the wonderful "The Emigrants". She has been too long away from the camera.The rest of the cast is also excellent. But Ms. Kohler: oh my, oh my, oh my.

I expected a 'small' film, very Scandinavian and moody about not much of anything. Instead, one of the most intriguing and suspenseful espionage stories ever AND based on a true case! Beautifully scripted, crisply directed and Liv Ullmann deftly underplaying her role steals every scene she is in! The spycraft is top-rate and believable and the human elements, above all, make this endlessly fascinating. I am not easy to please when it comes to Cold War thrillers.The central character is endlessly fascinating to think about. The way she lives a lie and yet really and truly loves and has a family. Seldom does a movie keep me thinking long afterwards as this did.

German screenwriter, film editor and director Georg Maas' second feature film which he co-directed with German screenwriter and cinematographer Judith Kaufmann and co-wrote with her and screenwriters Ståle Stein Nilsen and Christoph Tölle, is inspired by a novel called "Eiszeiten" by German author and journalist Hannelore Hippe. It premiered in Norway, was shot on locations in Norway and Germany and is a Germany-Norway co-production which was produced by producers Dieter Zeppenfeld, Axel Helgeland and Rudi Teichmann. It tells the story about a middle-aged woman named Katrine Myrdal who lives in a house near the coast in Bergen, Norway with her husband named Bjarte whom is in the Navy and their adult daughter named Anne whom is living there with her new-born daughter named Turid. Sometime after receiving a call from her mother named Åse Evensen whom is picked up at her house by Bjarte and Anne and brought to their home, Katrine is contacted by a German attorney named Solbach whom has knowledge about her history and who asks her to testify in a trial against the Norwegian Government. Subtly and engagingly directed by German filmmaker Georg Maas, this finely paced and somewhat fictional tale which is narrated from multiple viewpoints though mostly from the protagonist's point of view, draws a multifaceted and involving portrayal of a Norwegian citizen of German origins whom whilst looking for a nurse named Hiltrud Schlömer who used to work at an orphanage in Sachsenhausen, Germany during the Second World War meets a person who reminds her of her true identity. While notable for its naturalistic and atmospheric milieu depictions, sterling cinematography by German cinematographer Judith Kaufmann and fine production design by production designer Bader El Hindi and costume design by costume designer Ute Paffendorf, this character-driven and narrative-driven about the criminal SS organization called Lebensborn which was founded by the German Reichführer of the Schutzstaffel Heinrich Himmler (1900-1945) in Germany in the mid-1930s for the sake of realizing the Aryan visions of the Austrian-born Chancellor of Germany Adolf Hitler (1889-1945), which was prominent in occupied Norway (1940-1945), which focuses on some of those "many" children who were born, in this particular case, by Norwegian mothers who had been in extramarital relations with German SS members during World War II and the ostracizing treatment of these children and women in post-war Norway, depicts a refined study of character and contains a timely score by composers Christoph M. Kaiser and Julian Maas. This historic, atmospheric, modestly romantic and conversational drama which has been chosen as Germany's official submission to the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film at the 86th Academy Awards in 2014, which is set mostly in Norway and Germany in the late 1960s and early 1990s and where a daughter whom is considering to begin studying law meets a man whom is searching for information about her mother and a woman who suffered the consequences of her Nazi countrymen's disgraceful experiments on human lives is reunited with the men who recruited her, is impelled and reinforced by its fragmented narrative structure, substantial character development, efficient continuity, variegated characters, gripping flashback scenes, comment by Bjarte : "What is the truth?", the reverent and understated acting performances by German actress Juliane Köhler, Norwegian actor Sven Nordin, Norwegian actress Julia Bache-Wiig, German actress Klara Manzel and the noteworthy acting performance by Norwegian actress, screenwriter and director Liv Ullmann. An unsettling, heartrending and poignant thriller.