This story is based on the 2013 book The Nazi and the Psychiatrist by Jack El-Hai, which chronicled the relationship between U.S. Army psychiatrist Douglas Kelley (Rami Malek) and Nazi Reichsmarschall Hermann Göring (Russell Crowe) during the Nuremberg trials. The idea was that Kelley was supposed to discover what was different about the Germans’ personalities or psyches that would lead them to commit such horrible atrocities.
NUREMBERG
What’s it rated? R
When? 2025
Where’s it showing? Netflix
The film also explores U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice Robert Jackson (Michael Shannon), who’s tasked with creating an international tribunal—something that had never been done before—to hold the 22 Nazi defendants to account for their crimes against humanity. I knew the basics of the Nuremberg trials, but I certainly learned a lot more details of how they happened and the legalities around them.
This was a pretty low-budget film, but the cast and acting are first-rate. In addition to Crowe, Malek, and Shannon, Richard E. Grant stars as British barrister Sir David Maxwell-Fyfe, who was instrumental in forcing Göring’s confession. Leo Woodall is Sgt. Howie Triest, who acts as the story’s moral center. Spoiler alert! What was different about the Nazis’ psyches? Nothing. Anyone is capable of total moral collapse. (148 min.) ∆
—Glen
This article appears in March 26 – April 2, 2026.