TIFF 2025: Nuremberg Review

This will be one of many reviews during this year’s Toronto International Film Festival, to keep up with our latest coverage, click here.

Based on the book ‘The Nazi and the Psychiatrist’ by Jack El-Hai, Nuremberg is a film centered around the titular Nuremberg trials held by the Allies against leaders of Nazi Germany for the atrocities committed during World War II, specifically Adolf Hitler’s right hand man, Hermann Göring (Crowe), and Douglas Kelley (Malek), a psychiatrist tasked with evaluating Nazi leaders and their fitness for trial. What follows is a senseless encapsulation of serious subject matter that merely reduces it to quippy lines, alongside a jarring tone and overdramatized scenes. Meanwhile, when it comes to films about the Holocaust, filmmakers have a duty to treat the subject matter with care. If framed the wrong way, it could cause harm to audiences, leaving them with a warped understanding of an important moment in history. While the film fails to wield this particular moment of history in a harmful way, the quippy exchanges between Kelly and Göring make it clear that writer-director James Vanderbilt sees the subject matter as anything but serious. It appears that he seems more interested in making the film more appealing to a broader audience.

Alongside its almost offensively quippy dialogue, the film simply does not bring anything new or remotely interesting to the table. Similar to 2023’s ‘The Zone of Interest‘, Nuremberg tries to make Nazi generals into complex figures, but the way it is executed does little to commit to this idea. In this case, the film attempts to humanize Göring, focusing on his love for his family and his interest in magic, but never digging quite deep enough. Ultimately, a deep dive into the psyche of these men and into the idea of evil and morality would have been a better approach, rather than simply offering up answers to questions most audiences already know. 

The story itself is pretty standard fare, as over the course of Kelley’s evaluations, he forms a sort of bond with Göring, a powerful figure within the Nazi party. On the other hand, the trials themselves are certainly interesting, but they are accompanied by such a jarring tone where the film attempts to be funny and serious. Though this approach has worked in the past (see Jojo Rabbit), its execution here is borderline offensive and often felt out of place. That being said, there are some positives to be had. For one, the performances are certainly good. Malek is great despite his limited range, playing a character that feels like many of his others. Crowe relishes his material, showing off Göring’s charisma in impressive fashion, with most of the character issues being attributed to the script.

In spite of its flaws, Nuremberg has good intentions. It clearly wants to teach audiences about the Nuremberg trials in a way that is accessible to a broader audience, but how it goes about it where it truly fails. Seeing that history can often be seen as boring by some, it is understandable that filmmakers would want to take creative liberties to make it more palatable. Coming in with so much potential, boasting a stellar cast and centered around such important subject matter, it is a shame it had to be shoved into a melodramatic, poorly written, film befitting that of a made-for-TV movie.

still courtesy of Sony Pictures Classics

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Jasmine Graham