Interview with Stefan Ruzowitzky

Charged with the weight of embittered feelings, wartime dramas demand the drawing of a carefully considered line between historical fact and fiction. Sprouting from the very soil that bears the all too clear footprints of a sinister genocide, The Counterfeiters crosses the terrain with great prudence.

“I felt it is still important to tell the stories about the Nazis and about the Holocaust,” claims Austrian director Stefan Ruzowitzky, “and as I’m trying to reach a young audience, I have to tell the story in an attractive way. You can’t force them to see a movie so you have to seduce them with all the skills you have as a filmmaker.”

With two coexisting priorities of honouring the victims of the Third Reich with factual accuracy and enticing an audience with the promise of a thrilling experience, Ruzowitzky’s line twists and bends, vigorously aiming for the firm ground that will support both.

Based on Adolf Burger’s autobiography, The Devil’s Workshop, the film eschews synthetic sensationalism with relative ease. “The whole story is so full of bizarre details: music playing all day long to motivate the workers, the ping-pong table, the dancing... we didn’t have the need to invent anything on top because reality was absurd enough.”

In The Counterfeiters Jewish prisoners are pictured existing in surprising comfort with their Nazi oppressors willing to provide linen, hot water and even weekend entertainment to ensure the smooth running of operation Bernhard. And it all actually happened.

But this is more than just an extraordinary revelation. The Counterfeiters is about moral predicaments that are no less pertinent in today’s world. “The counterfeiters live in a very privileged situation but all the while they know that behind the wooden wall there is hell going on and their friends and family are being killed. And they don’t know how to deal with that morally. I think we who live in wealthy Western countries are in a similar situation; we know there are millions dying from starvation... but what are we supposed to do- not enjoy a good meal anymore? There are no easy answers and this is what I tried to convey through the heroes in my film.”