Von Werra (2002)

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Franz von Werra – a legendary figure in the Second World War. A Valais man who made a career for himself as a fighter pilot in Nazi Germany. In the fifties' classic „The One That Got Away” (1957), von Werra was immortalised, embodied by Hardy Krueger who based his international career on it.
Swiss filmmaker Werner Schweizer has a critical view on his compatriot. Through documents and memories of contemporary witnesses, Werner Schweizer’s film follows the unusual lives of the von Werra siblings. Their intimate correspondence lets us participate in their fate. We live through moments of advancement with them - their own as well as that of fascism. Franz reports about the front, about victory, about triumph: 'Warfare is extreme fun'.
Investigating common grounds as well as contradictions, the cinematic survey connects Franz von Werra’s biography and the one of his actor Hardy Krueger. VON WERRA tells about an extraordinary relationship of two siblings, about young men who, in the time of German fascism, were filled with enthusiasm about flying, and eventually about a tragic family fate in the Swiss Alps.