‘Nuremberg’ – Review
World War II began with the law. Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party manipulated, rewrote, and weaponised Germany’s legal system in 1933, twisting democracy into dictatorship and stripping an entire population of their human rights. Six years later, the world plunged into unprecedented chaos and violence, costing tens of millions of lives. And when the Allies finally secured victory, they vowed that the law, not vengeance, would end the Nazi regime once and for all.
Now, filmmaker James Vanderbilt brings this monumental moment back into focus with Nuremberg, a haunting psychological thriller that plunges audiences straight into the firestorm of the Nuremberg Trials. This is one of 2026’s most gripping, must-see cinematic events.
The Allies, led by the unyielding chief prosecutor, Robert H. Jackson (Michael Shannon), have the task of ensuring the Nazi regime answers for the unveiled horrors of the Holocaust while a US Army psychiatrist (Rami Malek) is locked in a dramatic psychological duel with former Reichsmarschall Herman Göring (Russell Crowe).
Adapted from Jack El-Hai’s The Nazi and the Psychiatrist, Vanderbilt crafts an edge-of-your-seat narrative that blends historical authenticity with nail-tight tension. The story follows U.S. Army psychiatrist Lt. Colonel Douglas Kelley (Rami Malek), assigned to assess the mental state of the surviving Nazi elite. His greatest challenge: Hermann Göring (Russell Crowe), the last titan of the regime to stand trial.
The result is a battle of wills that ebbs and flows with chilling unpredictability. Even knowing the outcome, you sit in your seat holding your breath, because how this conflict unfolds is where the true terror resides.
Facing off in the heart of this story are two Academy Award-winning heavyweights: Russell Crowe and Rami Malek, both delivering some of their most searing work to date.
Crowe undergoes a complete transformation as Reichsmarschall Hermann Göring. This is not a caricature, but a dangerously charismatic statesman basking in his own grandeur. Crowe plays him with a chilling cocktail of charm, wit, narcissism, and razor-sharp intelligence.
Göring voluntarily surrenders himself and steps onto the world stage once more, determined to win what he sees as the final battle of the war in the courtroom. He twists words, baits opponents, and manipulates every conversation as he fights to evade responsibility for genocide. Crowe’s presence is magnetic; every scene pulses with danger as he reveals Göring not as a mythical monster, but as something far more unsettling: a human being whose decisions led to catastrophic destruction.
It’s one of Crowe’s finest performances in years; an awards-level embodiment of a man both grandiose and grotesque.
Opposite him stands Rami Malek as Lt. Colonel Douglas Kelley. At first, Kelley appears slick, fast-talking huckster, almost opportunistic; someone who sees a personal opportunity in Nuremberg’s chaos. But as he confronts the true horrors committed by the Nazi regime, something deep inside him ruptures.
Kelley’s journey becomes the emotional spine of the film. He desperately seeks to understand how such atrocities were possible, and whether humanity can prevent them from happening again. Malek matches Crowe beat for beat, and their psychological combat becomes a riveting, high-stakes duel between two extraordinary performers operating at the peak of their craft.
Their dynamic is pure cinematic electricity.
Michael Shannon brings stoic intensity as Associate Justice Robert H. Jackson, the man tasked with ensuring that the Nazi leaders are judged by law, not vengeance. Shannon’s performance grounds the film in moral purpose, and Vanderbilt uses the courtroom sequences to steadily escalate tension until it feels like the walls themselves might crack under the weight of history.
With Dariusz Wolski’s gritty cinematography and Tyler Bates’ haunting operatic score, Nuremberg becomes an atmospheric powerhouse. The production design vividly resurrects post-war Germany, a world still smouldering, struggling to understand what has happened and what comes next.
But Vanderbilt refuses to look away from the atrocities revealed in the trial. This is a confronting watch. A necessary one. And in the current global climate, its relevance is impossible to ignore.
Nuremberg is intelligent, gripping, emotionally devastating cinema, anchored by towering performances from Crowe and Malek. It’s a film of immense weight and profound purpose, and without question one of the year’s most important releases.
Image:MadMan Entertainment
