The Boys from Brazil (1978)
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A desperate Nazi hunter and a cynical investigator must race against time to stop a sinister cloning plot involving the offspring of Adolf Hitler.
The story
After a young amateur Nazi hunter is killed while reporting a meeting of a fugitive Nazi organization in Paraguay, a cynical Nazi hunter named Ezra Lieberman begins an investigation. He discovers a pattern of deaths among elderly civil servants whose sons are all identical in appearance. With the help of a journalist and a vigilante leader, Lieberman uncovers a disturbing conspiracy involving the illegal adoption of children. The investigation leads him to a terrifying truth about the children's origins and the sinister motives of the organization behind their creation, forcing him to confront a high-stakes conspiracy involving the legacy of the Third Reich.
Full plot (contains spoilers)
After a young hunter is killed while reporting a meeting of the 'Kameraden' in Paraguay, Ezra Lieberman begins investigating a series of deaths of elderly civil servants. He discovers that the victims' sons are all identical, and that they were illegally adopted as part of a plot by Josef Mengele to create clones of Adolf Hitler. The goal is to have these boys grow up to establish new Nazi regimes. Lieberman learns that the murders are timed to mirror the death of Hitler's father. He eventually tracks down a target, Henry Wheelock, but finds that Mengele has already murdered him while impersonating Lieberman. In a final confrontation, Mengele attempts to convince one of the boys, Bobby, to embrace his destiny as a clone. Bobby orders his dogs to maul Mengele. Lieberman, recovering in a hospital, is asked by a vigilante leader to provide a list of the other clones so they can be eliminated. Lieberman refuses, choosing to believe the children are innocent, and burns the list.
- First release year
- 1978
- Runtime (minutes)
- 125
- Production countries
- United Kingdom; United States
- Original languages
- English
- Directors
- Franklin J. Schaffner
- Writers
- Heywood Gould · screenplay
- Cast and characters
- Gregory Peck · Dr. Josef Mengele; Laurence Olivier · Ezra Lieberman (loosely based on Simon Wiesenthal); James Mason · Col. Eduard Seibert; Lilli Palmer · Esther Lieberman; Uta Hagen · Frieda Maloney; Steve Guttenberg · Barry Kohler; Denholm Elliott · Sidney Beynon; Rosemary Harris · Frau Doring
- Themes
- cloning; legacy of Nazism; humanity vs. ideology
- Tone and mood
- suspenseful; gripping
- Setting
- Paraguay, Vienna, and rural Pennsylvania during the late 1970s.
- Premise and plot tags
- political thriller; science fiction; historical fiction
- Source material / true-story basis
- The Boys from Brazil by Ira Levin (1976)
- Reception
- The film received mixed to positive reviews, praised for its high-caliber cast and suspenseful atmosphere, though some critics found the script's handling of complex themes to be shallow.
- Awards and nominations
- Academy Award · Best Actor · nominated; Academy Award · Film Editing · nominated; Academy Award · Original Score · nominated; Golden Globe Award · Best Motion Picture Actor – Drama · won
- Production trivia
- The film was shot in Portugal because filming in South America was logistically impossible.; The film was released in an uncut version in the U.S. and Germany starting in 1999.
Genres
Film metadata comes from the open sources listed in Credits & Contact. Catalogue details may be incomplete.
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