The Nazi Officer's Wife

Synopsis: "The Nazi Officer's Wife" looks at the extraordinary and unforgettable life of Holocaust survivor Edith Hahn Beer. Born in Vienna in 1914, Edith Hahn was an outspoken young woman studying law in... "The Nazi Officer's Wife" looks at the extraordinary and unforgettable life of Holocaust survivor Edith Hahn Beer. Born in Vienna in 1914, Edith Hahn was an outspoken young woman studying law in Vienna when the Gestapo forced Edith and her mother into the Jewish ghetto. Soon Edith was deported to a labor camp, and though she convinced Nazi officials to spare her mother, when she returned home she discovered that her mother had been deported. Knowing she would become a hunted woman, Edith tore the yellow star from her clothing and went underground, scavenging for food and searching each night for a safe place to sleep. Her boyfriend, Pepi, proved too terrified to help her, but a Christian friend was not. With the Christian woman's identity papers in hand, Edith fled to Munich.

Edith was now what became known as a "U-boat" -- a fugitive hiding in plain sight in Nazi Germany. She got a job at the Red Cross and lived in a boarding house outside Munich. There she met Werner Vetter, a Nazi party member who fell in love with her. And despite her protests and even her eventual confession that she was Jewish, he married her and kept her identity secret. The two of them - the Nazi and his Jewish wife - lived out the war together, even bearing a child. Angela Vetter, their daughter is the only Jewish girl known to be born in a Nazi hospital.

Edith Hahn and her daughter survived the war, while potential exposure lurked at every corner. But Edith Hahn is not simply a hero ­ she is a complicated woman who kept her story of survival secret for nearly half a century, deceiving even her children. The film explores issues of faith, family and identity in this complex portrait of a woman who had to bury her true self in order to survive. -- © Seventh Art Releasing [More]

Starring: Susan Sarandon, Julia Ormond

Starring: Susan Sarandon, Julia Ormond

Studio: Seventh Art Releasing

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