Alternate Universe


I don't quite get the point of the alternate universe in this case... I mean... Basically we see a history movie, but with the one element changed, that the Nazis are winning? Where exactly is the point in that?

I mean, yes, picturing a world 50 oder 100 years after the Nazis won sounds very interesting to me. But a world that differs only by one event (this one war) which is not even over yet? I don't get it. Why would someone create this universe?
What plot or story could the author hope for that was not already part of the first or second world war a hundred times over?

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Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? - Who watches the watchmen?

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It's called having an imagination. "What if" is always a great start for a novel/movie - looking at how things might be if just one event in history has a different outcome.

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It's called having an imagination. "What if" is always a great start for a novel/movie - looking at how things might be if just one event in history has a different outcome.


There's no one event that would have given the Germans victory. If Szilard had gotten hit by a car and Hitler had lit a fire under Heisenberg, then maybe there could have been a German victory in the offing. But short of Germany getting the Bomb, there was no way they could win once the Russians got rolling.

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What if the Russians never got rolling? I don't know, i've never read the book. But it sounds to me a failed D-day and successful counter-attack wasn't the only change.

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What if the Russians never got rolling?


Then August 6, 1945 Berlin would have ceased to exist. Followed shortly after by the rest of Germany.

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It is a conceit to suggest that the defeat of Nazism relied on Britain's defeat, which in fact was just a side show compared to the main theatre fo war onteh Eastern front.

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For you in particular.BUt also in general.

Had Britain lost the battle of Britain the USA would have probably SIDED with Germany. They wee looking [waiting]for someone to aid and aiding the stronger might have been a good idea. A Mr Kennedy of that time really was in love with Britain and how it turned him into a bootlegger. ALLEGEDLY.

Remember the USA made money out of both world wars. It is now suggested that they have looted the middle east.

It certainly would have had no half way staging post at that time to attack Europe if the British Isles had been overrun.

I have not yet seen this particular movie so cannot comment on its worth but I did see war of the worlds, Independence day, the day after tomorrow, battle for la, and know these did not happen.

A Nazi Britain has been filmed before the book written by Robert Harris and filmed called Fatherland starring Rutger Hauer. Len Deighton also wrote SS GB.
So subject matter not new.

You have had Red Dawn.

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"What if" only works if the premise is interesting in some way. If you based a movie on, say Jesse Owens in the 1936 Olympics, except in this time line he has a really bad hangnail and isn't sure if he can win. Then you proceed with the story but never quite show you if the outcome is any different.. What's the point?

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by - kell_smurthwaite on Wed Oct 5 2011 15:55:23

It's called having an imagination. "What if" is always a great start for a novel/movie - looking at how things might be if just one event in history has a different outcome.

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That's how exactly it was with me in this movie, an imaginative "what if".
Haven't read the novel.

The moment the opening scene displayed the text ... "After the failure of D-Day, Britain has been invaded by Germany", I immediately knew this is an imaginary premise, and I got curious what it was going to be all about. I've read some about WWII and knew that wasn't the case, but I'm not interested in the details of how that imaginary premise is plausible or implausible.

The early scenes making it known this movie isn't going to be about wartime governance, politics and strategies and was more about how both the people in this remote Welsh village and the small group of enemies conducted themselves in these circumstances was what interested me the most, and had me riveted through to the end.

How those left behind in the village - old ones, the wives, those still young to join the armed resistance - will now have to cope without the farmer-husbands, especially when the small troop of German war-weary soldiers with their captain came. The particular, individual ways the villagers attempted to resist these enemies, and how survival played a part in their decisions - for both villagers and invaders was what kept me glued to my seat.

I don't know anyone of the actors except for Michael Sheen, having seen him in a few movies, and that contributed much to what I think are impressive performances, restrained drama all-around, which to me added more tension to the critical situation. Even the boy who cried for punishing the collaborator by shooting her horse, expressed his emotions just right.




Truth inexorably,inscrutably seeks and reveals Itself into the Light.

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I haven't seen the film yet (it hasn't been released in Germany yet), so I am going with what I know from the book.
The book takes its cue from the WW2 Auxiliary Units. I hadn't heard about them before. The author, Owen Shears, also did a short radio documentary on them, that is still available: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00vr59t. The tales he heard about them when he grew up inspired him to write this story. So, in order to have a story about them, he had to get the Germans into the picture :-). That in the end we don't get to see much (if anything) of the AU is the authors prerogative --he found it more interesting to explore the interaction between Welsh villagers and the occupiers than to write about partisan warfare, apparently.
Of course I asked "What about the Soviet Union?", but then I just went along with the story and waited where it would take me. Suspension of disbelief :-).
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"Das Lied schadet doch hoffentlich nicht Ihrem ideologischen Unterbau?" (Das Boot, 1981)

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Since I'm 4/5 through the book that the movie is based on and keep thinking that there should be a movie made, I am surprised to find that (YEA!) this rich human drama set in a small timeless place was made visual. Perhaps it did not translate well to the screen, I will have to see. OR the image of German soldiers is too evocative of our need for historical reality. I think that the story must be set in that time to depict the resistance fighters accurately, and the Nazi presence is fearful, creating the tension. Sheers explains that the Germans were depleted which allows for this ongoing isolation of farmers and German soldiers in the Valley. So, the stage is set for a beautifully written story about the human beings in that fabled situation.
I am captivated by most things Wales, and historical fiction will do just fine. Ill still get the movie (amazon.uk) to see all the action on the farms. I encourage you to read the book, very much the handiwork of a poet. It is suspenseful and captivating.

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