Sins of the Fathers

Based on the real-life little-known story of a 1938 attempt on Adolf Hitler’s life, Stern and Winter’s workmanlike sequel to 2020’s Wolf picks up the action where its predecessor left off in 1934. During WWI, an unidentified amnesiac German soldier injured in the Second Battle of the Marne was sent to a hospital for psychiatric treatment. Known as Patient X, he was given the name of a dead patient, Friedrich Richard. Adolf Hitler was in the bed next to his, being treated for hysterical blindness. The two became friends, and Friedrich went on to become an SS general and one of Hitler’s most trusted advisers after the Nazis took power. When Hitler’s real agenda about war and the treatment of Jews becomes apparent, Friedrich decides the Führer must be eliminated, and he meets with other conspirators to plan and execute the assassination. Friedrich’s romance with photographer Carla Bartheel adds a bit of heat, but the entire enterprise falls apart when a secondary story concerning Friederich’s real identity limps to a halt along with the cabal’s failure to kill Hitler. The Day of the Jackal this isn’t. (Feb.)