The Boat

It’s a good few years since my dad and I, still a little nipper, watched the original cut of Das Boot together. It was on an old, scruffy VHS and we watched on a Tesla tube, maybe four-color TV. I remember to this day how I for some time after I would avoid using the aged, creaky elevator in our block (just in case, you never know, do you?), which gave out almost dangerously similar sounds as the U-boat did under crushing pressure of the mass of water above it. To this day, I carry with me the impressions I got from the first movie I ever saw that told me that war is a bitch that impacts most regular people and that not all Germans are necessarily baddies. Many, many years later I purchased a DVD with a new, almost three and a half hour cut. And for a long time I resisted sinking into the salty waters of the Atlantic. I had a sort of foreboding that this might sully my untainted memory of this movie. And unfortunately I was right. The new version is of course outstanding, but it doesn’t seem nearly as intense as the original. In places it even starts to drag on. But maybe that is because of my nostalgia. But maybe not. Ping.......Ping.....Ping...Ping.Ping.Ping...Ping.....Ping.......Ping Original cut: 5/5, Director’s cut: 4/5, Special edition: ?/5 (04/01/2008)

One of the greatest war films of all time and certainly the best submarine film the silver screen has ever seen. Petersen masterfully transfers emotions to the viewer – distress, fear, panic. This is not a glorified Nazi submarine fleet, but a disillusioning view beneath the surface of the war. Both the acting performances and the conclusion of the film, which is miles away from the pathetic finale of many war films, contribute to the suggestiveness... As I've written before: a film like this says a lot more about the horror of war than all of Saving Private Ryan and his dead brothers. (02/15/2004)

I have just watched a film from the category of those that must be viewed out of obligation, as they represent a genre foundation from which orientation in the field of cinema derives. I understand what Petersen was trying to do and what most viewers appreciate about the film. The life of sailors on a submarine is framed by duty, stress, routine, fear, and claustrophobia. However, some people say that the film's long duration is not at all an obstacle but based on my personal experience, I cannot agree with that. Regardless of how grand the spectacle may have appeared, it was tiresome for me, and I would be a hypocrite if I were to join the choir singing praises. I could not empathize with the characters of the crew, no character truly interested me, and I did not embrace any of them as my own. And for the third time, one must wonder how many opponents of Nazism were found in Germany during the wartime period and how casually they actually freely spoke aboard a warship. Three stars are a formal acknowledgment of Petersen's craftsmanship in the epic film, but The Boat was not a film that I loved and I will not revisit it in the future. Overall impression: 55%. (08/07/2019)

This is one of the few films where the overlong runtime is justified. If it hadn't been for the time I spent with the crew of the German submarine, I would hardly have been able to fully empathize with their plight. As time went on, I felt like I was in the bowels of a submarine with them, and I admit that it made me very uncomfortable more than once. I was even more impressed by the last dramatic minutes of the story, which were filled with absolute despair and doom. (80%) (08/30/2021)

Each character in the script has their own depth and each plays a smaller or larger, but similarly key role in the film. The outstanding actors also contribute to the excellent result. Jürgen Prochnow excels in the lead role of the captain, but he unfortunately drowned his promising career in B-movie waters. Wolfgang Petersen directed an atmospheric film that is probably still unmatched within the genre. (03/12/2005)