I think I'm with a number of other reviewers here in doubting the veracity of this supposedly true story.All the way through it, I found myself thinking "that could happen - yeah right!!" and I was frankly extremely surprised at the end to discover that this movie is supposedly based on Solomon Perel's real life adventures during WWII. And I say adventures I think advisedly because of the actual unlikelihood that what is portrayed on screen had much at all to do with the reality of his situation at that time.I wanted to like "Europa Europa" as much as I liked "Olivier Olivier" and "The Secret Garden The Secret Garden" and more recently "In Darkness In Darkness" but I'm afraid that the improbably of the many situations portrayed here just detracted greatly from the experience for me.It also needs to be said I think that the apparently small budget spent on production of this movie (small compared to Hollywood admittedly) showed at times with sometimes less than convincing battle scenes in particular.It's not a bad movie by any means; just disappointing. In closing this review, I will say that I watched the DVD for the first time just last night, noticing as I opened the cellophane wrapper that I have had it in my collection for a very very long time, probably 20 years. Regrettably, for the DVD at least, it's not a movie I'll be watching again any time soon.JMV

A boy (Marco Hofschneider) in Nazi Germany, trying to conceal that he is Jewish, joins the Hitler Youth.The film won the Golden Globe Award for Best Foreign Language Film and was nominated for the Academy Award: Best Writing Adapted Screenplay, but lost the award to "The Silence of the Lambs". It had been expected to be nominated for Best Foreign Language Film but Germany did not submit it.One can understand why Germany was a bit embarrassed. Even today (2015), it is impossible to live down their Nazi past. No one thinks badly of Germany now, and almost everyone alive at the time is today gone. But it's something that will haunt them for a while yet. Films like this probably do not help, even if they tell a powerful story.

This international co-production (Germany, France, Poland) unfolds a real story of Solomon Perel, a German Jewish boy whose most teen and youth years remained under the oppression of both Nazis and Soviets, mostly during World War II (1938-1944). Being a Jew was "non-welcome" in both dictatorships, under Nazi rule, however, it was oppressed and punished directly, thus Solomon had to become Jozef and became an elite "Aryan" German to almost all around him. Thanks to enormous luck, knowledge of languages and desire for survival, he managed to stay alive in different places and rules (by the way, he is still alive, although was born in 1925!).All this is aptly depicted, and despite the tragic background, there are several absurd, hearty and even comic moments in his unwanted journey between Berlin, Lodz and Grodno, reflecting the fast changes of that period (no wonder that the film won the Golden Globe Award for Best Foreign Language Film and was nominated for the Academy Award: Best Writing Adapted Screenplay). The cast is even and plausible as well, particularly Marco Hofschneider as Solomon/Jozef who is always visible. Perel appears briefly as himself in the finale.A good and versatile film (there are not too many dealing with events both in the Soviet and Nazi regimes), but the non-original title referring to Europe is confusing, providing a distorted and/or uninviting picture about the real nature of the film.

Europa Europa is the remarkable true story of Salomon Perel, a young teenage Polish Jew, who passed himself off as, not merely German, but also, as a member of the highest order of the Hitler Youth, while all the time sticking to his Judaic roots, in order to survive the war. The storytelling aspects of the film gives this it drive and purpose and are excellent - based on Perel's extraordinary autobiography it avoids extrapolation and sticks to his tale.It scores very high in two vital aspects - one, the script is superb, (It was Oscar nominated) and two it was shot in German which given it subject matter was no small achievement.The film is well directed, though because of it's use of studio lighting and bright colors it has not aged as well as some of the Holocaust corpus.There are perhaps better films and books that express the absolute evil of the death camps, Weisel and Levi being two prime examples in authorship, but this is a unique perspective as it is not centered on the Shoah but rather on the unique conundrum of daring to survive by living in the heart of the Nazis' twisted dream, and one definitely worth your time - it is a truly fascinating true story with some strong adventure and drama elements.