Radical Evil

The documentary takes on a violence carried out in the Second World War. Two million Jewish civilians were shot in Eastern Europe in 1941. Special units carried this out. The men in those units were for the large part ordinary young men. They had no military or criminal past. The film asks how such people took part. It argues over the share of orders and of personal decision. Letters and diaries are used as sources. Actors read the texts aloud. Staged scenes come in between. Psychologists and historians give their views. Experiments and studies are reported. The film offers no easy explanation. The question still stands open at the end. Devid Striesow and Benno Fürmann appear in the ninety six minute documentary. It is an Austrian and German production Stefan Ruzowitzky finished in 2014.