The most striking thing in this section of the film to me was all the children. While I’m sure that Goebbels did really have children, we know that Peter the young soldier boy is fictitious. Also, the physician might have been real as well as his children. The scene where the people at the well get bombed out shows more children. While the film makers may be showing accurate parts of this event with Goebbel’s children, he definitely added characters to make a point.
The Goebbel’s children seem like they are not even aware that a war is going on. When they get to the bunker, they shout and laugh when they get into their bunks, they have toys, and they are excited to meet and sing for Hitler. While the adults show extreme signs of stress, these children seem completely oblivious to whats happening outside the bunker. While the youngest ones might not understand, the older children should definitely be showing some signs of concern like everyone else in the bunk, save Eva Braun.
The next child that is focused on is Peter. He is always alone in this section of the movie. Everyone around him is dead. The only people that he was working with, the other child soldiers, are dead all around him. While in the previous scenes he was extremely courageous and ambitious, he now does not even have a gun or look for anyone to shoot. He hides when he can, and even fell asleep. It is interesting to compare Peter to the Goebbels children. He is probably the same age as at least one of them, and he is in the middle of the war. Meanwhile, kids his same age are frolicking around without a care in the world in a bunker. Peter finally runs home when he wakes up next to a half-buried dead girl. His father and mother are extremely happy that he came home. He has a fever, but they are just thankful he is alive like most parents would be, except Magda Goebbels who is planning to kill her children. Peter and his family probably have no way of escaping alive, while Magda was given a choice to leave by Speer, but refused and would rather kill herself and her children. The parallel between these two families is very significant, I think, because Peter’s family represents the emotions that a normal family would have in this situation, while the Goebbel’s family shows the side of a totalitarianism government. Magda acts all dramatic that her heart can’t take it, meanwhile she is choosing to put herself in that situation. She doesn’t want her children to have a future, which is the exact opposite of any other parent I’ve ever encountered. She exhibits similar traits to Hitler; extreme selfishness and failure to think about what is the best for anyone else. Peter’s family on the other hand is just praying that Peter will return every day/night and that they will make it through the war.
The next children shown are the physicians children at the dinner table. After the physician is denied by Hitler permission to leave Berlin, he goes to the dinner table, acts normal, and proceeds to kill his family. Right before he detonated the explosive, the film shows the little girl feeding her doll. Right after the explosion, all we see is smoke and the doll laying on the ground. This shows more human suffering and the fact that these children’s lives were taken prematurely. While they probably would not have a good fate in Berlin, their father made the decision to end their lives without their knowledge. The film makers show these types of scenes to show the parallels of all the families left in Berlin. The Nazi’s families seem to be destructive and selfish, while normal families like Peter’s show compassion and love in a time like this.
Finally, the scene where the people at the well getting water got hit with artillery, children are shown laying on the ground after the smoke clears. Their mothers and family members run to their side and cry when they see they are dead. This is another normal emotion of normal people affected by war. After the physician blew up his family, there was no following scene showing sympathy for this family or the children. However, when the children at the well died, the families showed extreme sadness and emotion. Showing that these families in Berlin are capable of normal emotions just emphasizes the fact that Nazi families are dehumanized and incapable of normalcy.
