According To The variety Based on a true story of German resistance to the Third Reich during World War 2, “Truth and Treason” plays it conventionally straight. The familiar elements of a historic film telling an epic story are all there: the righteous hero, the conflicted villain, the systemic violence. There are fiery speeches, chase scenes and tense moments. But Matthew Whitaker’s film never surprises at any point during its running time, failing to add any singular artistic flair. While telling a compelling story, it plays like so many other films about that dark time in not-so-distant European history. Helmuth Hübener (Ewan Horrocks) is a religious 17-year-old living an ordinary life with his family in Hamburg — as ordinary as can be during the troubled time the film takes place. He goes to school, plays with his friends and even gets a job at a local government office. Then he starts questioning what was happening around him. The bishop in his church begins to pledge allegiance to Adolf Hitler before his sermons. His inclusive Mormon church bans Jews from entering its premises. One day, he discovers that one of closest friends, Solomon Schwarz (Nye Occomore), has been abducted by the state for being Jewish. When his older brother brings home a radio that plays stations from outside Germany, especially the BBC, he starts to realize that what he’s being told is all lies and propaganda. As a studious and smart young man, Hübener has a knack for oratory and writing influenced by his love of reading. He uses those skills and what he learns listening to the news on the radio to write pamphlets about the truth of the war. He enlists two of his friends, Karl-Heinz Schnibbe (Ferdinand McKay) and Rudi Wobbe (Daf Thomas) to distribute them all over Hamburg. There’s a propulsive energy to those early scenes. Whitaker, working from a screenplay he wrote with Ethan Vincent, manages to create some tension-filled moments. What happens to Schwaz is not overtly shown. The audience is only privy to his fear in the moments leading up to his abduction — and to Hübener’s devastating discovery in the aftermath — although there’s plenty of violence, with many fist fights and beatings resulting in blood-soaked faces as Hübener deals with the wrath of Nazi sympathizers in his community, including his own stepfather (Sean Mahon).
True to the facts, the courageous teenager is eventually caught by the Gestapo. The second half of the film dissolves in a dreary interrogation and torture narrative. As the investigator, Rupert Evans takes a larger role in the narrative. At first, he can’t fathom that this teenager is working alone, yet as he gets to know him, a sense of admiration creeps in. This part of the film is much more obvious and less energetic than what precedes it. Still, Horrocks and Evans match each other well as the relationship between captive and jailer is explored.
Despite these mostly persuasive elements, “Truth and Treason” is ultimately an old-fashioned period piece with epic aspirations. The characters and narrative are accompanied by sweeping, intrusive music that tries hard to dictate to the audience exactly how to feel at every beat of the story. The actors speak in clipped English accents that seem jarring to the German story. The script does not allow for shading to the characters, with the exception of Evans’: They are presented either as good-hearted and supportive of Hübener or outright odious fascists out to get him.
“Truth and Treason” is a well-intentioned, competently made film that never transcends the safety of its own conventions. Whitaker makes a sincere film full of admiration for Hübener’s courage and idealism. However, sincerity cannot make up for stereotypical storytelling. This is a dutiful attempt at re-creating the life of a noble man that nonetheless does not offer its audience much in the way of art or entertainment.