Death is a master from Germany - August Diehl in "The Disappearance of Josef Mengele"

Rat lines – this was the name given to the escape routes that leading Nazis and SS members used to escape to South America via Italy and Spain after 1945. Among them was Josef Mengele, the Auschwitz camp doctor who conducted selections and inhumane medical experiments on prisoners at the infamous "ramp."

Mengele was never caught. Numerous myths and conspiracy theories arose about his whereabouts until his remains were discovered in the cemetery in Embrú, Brazil, in 1985.

Kirill Serebrennikov's "The Disappearance of Josef Mengele" certainly also contributes to this demythologization. The film's action begins in 1956 in Buenos Aires, where Mengele (August Diehl) frantically packs his suitcases, steps out with his coat turned up and sunglasses on, and gets into a taxi to the airport. A handheld camera follows him – the film will repeatedly recreate this intrusive, uncomfortable proximity to the war criminal.

For many years, Mengele and his fellow Nazis felt safe in Argentina—until the overthrow of ruler Juan Perón. In 1956, he even traveled back to Günzburg, Bavaria, for a few days without being disturbed to meet his relatives. Mengele could rely on a network in South America and the support of his family.

When his son Rolf (Maximilian Meyer-Bretschneider) visits him in São Paulo in 1977, he tries to confront his unknown father. While Mengele angrily evades the accusations, the film switches from grim black and white to the colorized format of an amateur film. In idyllic colors, we see the young Mengele, with a joyful expression on his face, sorting those arriving at the Auschwitz gas chamber ramp.

Even while working in the hospital barracks, he looks cheerfully into the camera while a man with a deformed back is measured and casually shot in the head in the courtyard. A short time later, Mengele dissects the corpse like an animal carcass on the dissection table.

Even though the film depicts these bestial acts from the distance of a fake amateur video, the images are stomach-churning. The ever-courageous August Diehl plays Mengele in a disturbing performance as a deeply poisoned soul who develops no sense of remorse and clings to his worldview until death.

With a clear, cool, analytical stance, the film looks deep into the heart of darkness and shows how closely racism and paranoia were linked in Mengele's mind - an unfortunate alliance that can still be observed today in the resurgence of right-wing radicalism.

“The Disappearance of Josef Mengele,” directed by Kirill Serebrennikov, with August Diehl, 135 minutes, FSK 12 (in cinemas from October 23)