German novelist Hans Fallada had a complicated relationship with the National Socialists. He survived to watch the regime fall, but not long enough to see the publication of his most celebrated novel, a fictionalized account of underground anti-Nazi activists Otto and Elise Hampel (renamed Otto and Anna Quangel).
In 2009, the belated English translation became a surprise bestseller. Their story of resistance gets the big screen treatment in Vincent Pérez’s English language “Alone in Berlin,” which opens Friday, Jan. 13, in New York.
"Alone" demonstrates why Emma Thompson and Brendan Gleeson got to be such accomplished old pros.
