“Although a great many documentaries on the Third Reich and some on the social history of Nazi Germany have been broadcast on German television, this is one of the first that has dealt exclusively with the Kleinbuerger (little man) conformist who went along with the escalating events between 1933 and 1945. Tadelloeser & Wolff... based on an autobiography of Walter Kempowski, was aired in primetime on the working man's May Day holiday and has left a wake of public and critical response ever since.
“Author Kempowski... grew up playing with toy soldiers in the 30s... experienced the bombing of a factory next door to his house... watched the family get drawn more and more into events they only half understood but never questioned outright....
“It was Kempowski who contacted Fechner to film his first novel, the title of which was drawn from slang the boys in the family used in imitation of the father's preference for a cigar brand, ‘Loeser & Wolff.' The names can also be coined to mean the ‘blameless' and the ‘wolves' - thus the documentary goes to the heart of the social conditions under Hitler to mirror and weigh the moral cost of conformity....
“The picture is done in flashback with a narrator setting the scene as Kempowski himself is telling the story.... Father and mother are charming, memorable figures, and the humor surrounding the father's fantasy-filled, self-made proverbs capture much of the absurdities and dead seriousness of the times....”