THE NINTH DAY aka DER NEUNTE TAG

Year: 2002
USA: Kino International
Cast: Ulrich Matthes, August Diehl, Hilmar Thate, Bibiana Beglau, Germain Wagner, Jean-Paul Raths, Ivan Jirik Karel Hromadka, Miroslav Sichmann, Adolf Filip, Vladimir Fiser, Peter Varga, Petr Janis, Zdenek Pechacek, Vaclav Kratky, Marcel Svidrman, Karel Dobry, Götz Burger, Michael König, Vladimir Gut
Director: Volker Schlöndorff
Countries: Germany / Luxembourg
Language: German (English subtitles)
USA: 98 mins
USA Release Date: 27 May 2005 (Limited Release - New York)
(in German)

Synopsis

From Volker Schlöndorf, director of the Academy Award-winning THE TIN DRUM, THE NINTH DAY is a heart-breaking story of a Catholic priest forced to choose between his ideals and his fellow clergymen held at Auschwitz.

Abbe Kremer is released from a living hell in the Dachau concentration camp and sent home to Luxembourg. Upon his arrival, he soon learns that this is not a reprieve or a pardon of his crime - voicing opposition to the Nazis' racial laws - but that he has nine days to convince the bishop of Luxembourg to work with the Nazi occupiers.

Gestapo Untersturmfuhrer Gebhardt is under pressure from his superior to have the Abbe succeed in creating a rift between the Luxembourg church and the Vatican - or be transferred to duty in the death camps in the East. Gebhardt, a former Catholic seminarian, uses theological arguments to bring the Abbe around but when they don't work he resorts to more draconian measures. The Abbe is torn between his conscience and his horror of returning to Dachau...