Des Teufels General

The Devil's General is a 1955 black and white West German film based on the play of the same title by Carl Zuckmayer. The film features Curd Jürgens as General Harras, Marianne Koch, Viktor de Kowa, Karl John, Eva Ingeborg Scholz, and Harry Meyen. It was shot at the Wandsbek Studios in Hamburg. The film's sets were designed by the art directors Albrecht Becker and Herbert Kirchhoff. It was a number of films made in Germany in the 1950s that emphasised resistance to Hitler among German generals in World War Two. Others included Canaris, Children, Mother, and the General, and The Last Ten Days. Plot Nazi Germany in 1941. The title character is Luftwaffe General Harras, a highly decorated World War I veteran contemptuous of the Third Reich and the World War II attempt to conquer Europe. Initially courted by SS officials, he continually mocks the Nazi leadership, which leads to friends turning into enemies and suspicion from SS and Gestapo of what may be treason. He is temporarily arrested by order of Heinrich Himmler and, after his release, is determined to break his deal with the devil. He backs the sabotage action of his flight engineer, threatens an SS officer at gunpoint and finally crashes his aircraft into the control tower of his airbase.