Of all of the Nazi's, Albert Speer is the most interesting and complicated of those surviving and tried at Nuremberg. I've read all of the books including my favorites "The Good Nazi" by Dan Van Der Vat which was the 1st and most accurate portrayal & w/out any of Albert Speers twisting of truths, & the best of the books by Gitta Sereny called "Albert Speer: His battle w/truth." Sebastian Koch gives a great performance & my only real complaint is I didn't care too much for the man playing Hitler, although he did a pretty good job but his eyes were WAY too blue & he was too skinny. He did have a lot of his mannerisms down pretty well but as much as they focused on Speer they could have focused on him even more. Overall I thought they did a pretty fantastic job I just wish they spent a little more time w/the other convicted Nazi War Criminals as he did spend 20 years there. This is a pretty comprehensive mini-series & It really doesn't need to be done again I just wish they could have done a few things differently. If you are interested in Speer another few books are also good to read. Of course you have to read Speers own 3 books as long as you don't take them for fact because of course he wants to make himself look good. They are "Inside the Third Reich, The Spandau Diaries, & Infiltration." Spandau is excellent w/some of the daily routines & some of the rivalries between these men especially Erich Raedar head of the Navy till 1943 & Karl Doenitz head of the U-boat's who then took over that job & disagreed w/each other hugely about the importance of the U-boats, but by '43 it was too late. Everyone disliked Rudolph Hess (Hitlers Deputy) and they all still pretty much thought he was a traitor for his strange flight to England in 1941. If he were to be Psychologically evaluated today, I'm sure he would treated for something, or maybe he knew the futility of the war by 1941. Anyway the film is very good & I particularly liked the interviews that are blended well intermittently that his now older kids & their honest answers. Especially liked seeing that Albert Speer Jr. ended up being an architect despite that's what his father did. The big question is would Speer have been charged w/so much at Nuremberg if he had never become the Minister of Armaments. It was even worse because he was so proficient at it he extended a lost war a minimum of 6 months up to a year. If you are a WWII scholar, or just want to know more about the mystery that was Albert Speer, this is a must watch.
