Trailer
Plot summary
Late in 1937, Nanjing is home to John Rabe, who has directed the local Siemens subsidiary for almost thirty years, and to his wife Dora. Handing the plant to his successor Fliess is a professional setback. At the farewell ball in his honor, Japanese planes bomb the city, and Rabe opens the company gate so panicked civilians can shelter. The next morning the foreigners still in the city consider what they can do. Dr. Georg Rosen describes the safety zone set up in Shanghai, and Ambassador Oskar Trautmann and Valérie Dupres of the International Girls College support the same idea for Nanjing. Because Germany is Japan's ally, Rabe is chosen to chair the committee, though Dr. Robert O. Wilson, an American who heads a local hospital, is at first unwilling to join.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about John Rabe (2009)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- In Japan, no major film company would attend a screening of John Rabe, and one potential distributor asked director Florian Gallenberger to cut all footage of Prince Asaka, commander of the Japanese forces in the final assault on Nanjing; he refused.
- Filming on John Rabe was halted over concerns for good relations tied to a major gas exploration joint-venture, and the go-ahead came again only after a Japanese school book was published that left out the Nanjing Massacre.
- John Rabe had no theatrical release in Japan; it was one of several films marking the 70th anniversary of the Nanjing events and drew vociferous opposition from far-right ultranationalists, who released their own films claiming the Nanjing Massacre never happened.
- John Rabe won four German Film Awards — Best Film, Best Actor for Ulrich Tukur, Best Production Design and Best Costume Design — and Steve Buscemi's Best Supporting Actor nomination was one of the few Lolas ever given to a non-German.
- Most characters in John Rabe are historically accurate, but Minnie Vautrin, the real director of the Ginling Girls College and a key member of the Nanjing Safety Zone committee, was replaced by a fictional French character, Valérie Dupres, who runs an invented International Girls College.
