What part of this is true? Camp (as it was then) McCoy was a POW camp ... that much is true. Officers were typically separated from enlisted. Nobody was allowed to where their uniforms. Where did the boy come from? Although the PW's were treated well (better that or troops were) they did not get to roam around at night. 'Frank' did nothing after the SS officer night walked in on his wife ... nope ... it was only after his daughter told him what she saw the SS officer did (yuk!!!)to the boy (Heinrich)that he manned up and went after the SS officer? True story? OK ...They go on a picnic with no food? Nobody cooked at all for this family? Certainly the mother didn't do much beside trot around being sensual? Answering the Camp switch board like it was a bordello? At the movies end ... some information on the 'real people' was given ... so ... what happened to her little brother? This movie was a waste of time to watch and a waste of time to make. People should not play with history.

For those of us who grew up in this era, this movie was a very lovely trip down memory lane. As others have commented, the acting in this movie was not the best, but the attempt to recreate the era was quite realistic and exceptionally well done. The living conditions, the technology, the social mores and the nature of life at the time were very accurate well depicted. I personally served at Ft McCoy and can vouch for the authenticity of the site and the facilities depicted in the film. This is a film that preserves an important historic story about a special place, like many other such places in WWII, and a unique group of people serving their county in whatever way they could and trying at the same time to preserve some sense of normalcy. I highly recommend it.

The story is a little simple and sentimental, but I didn't have any expectations. I think the cast does a good job with the material that doesn't have enough time to fully flesh out the characters. Eric Stoltz is good too; I never really understood why he didn't get bigger roles. Maybe, his roles will get a second wind when he doesn't look 13. It's a little bit Leave It To Beaver, so is probably popular with the Christian crowd.I found the movie randomly on Netflix but I clicked on it because I was a kid on Ft. McCoy as well. There were only about 4 kids on the post in 1978, and I do remember a 1950's purity of living there. We lived so far apart we never saw each other except when a jeep picked us up to take us into the schools in Sparta. The POW fences and towers remained, but it was a ghost town except in the summer when reservists showed up to bomb the ranges into oblivion. Years later, after we left, they would turn the barracks, not the compounds into a camp for Cuban "refugees." The movie captured a certain feel to the place that I liked...beautiful woods, Squaw lake, and some old fashioned values that remained on army posts into the 80's at least. It was a fun place to be a kid but the movie only has time to give you a glimpse of that.

Overall I'm a bit disappointed. I thought this would be an interesting period piece, and I'm a fan of (looking at) Lyndsy Fonseca, who I think is the most beautiful actress out there. While watching this film I kept having to remind myself that it was filmed 5 years ago. Perhaps during this time, Lyndsy Fonseca has gotten a ton of experience from filming Nikita, Kick Ass, etc. and took lots of acting classes. Honestly I thought her acting was stiff and basically poor in this. The beginning scenes were especially tough to watch. Getting past that, Eric Stoltz carried the film and delivered a believable performance. I think the supporting cast let him down. Also I wish they had developed some of the story lines of these characters a little bit better. I will say I think the kids in the film did a good job. I was looking forward to seeing the depiction of a US POW camp. After seeing the film, I question their depiction of the prison camp. The real Fort McCoy was/is huge. There were 4000+ POW's there. From this film, you'd think it was a small place where everyone knew each other. The budget probably made it necessary to slim things down quite a bit.