by SARAH ROWLAND

The only downside to Sophie Scholl: The Final Days is in the title itself, or rather the way in which director Marc Rothemund interprets it. He literally follows the final six days of the titular hero’s life, leaving very little room for insight into her character.

Based on resurfaced historical records, Rothemund starts his very detailed account of Sophie’s week-long incarceration with her arrest. The year is 1943 and Sophie (Julia Jentsch), a member of the student-based resistance group called the White Rose, volunteers to help hand out stacks of anti-Nazi flyers on campus. The hope being that her sex will somehow make her more inconspicuous. Not so. She and her brother are busted pretty much on the spot and sentenced to death.

This is where one might expect some flashbacks into Sophie’s history. Instead the film spends a little too much time on the interrogation process, where the courageous co-ed is grilled about the whereabouts of her fellow White Rose activists. Clearly, half of these scenes are necessary, if only to show how loyal she was to her cause—even when she was offered a stay of execution in exchange for some names, she never caves.

However, the other half could have easily been cut in lieu of some lead-up to her imprisonment, or better yet some background into her political awakening. We know she’s a strong, fearless young woman—this is especially true in the chilling courtroom scenes where she takes on the infamous “blood judge” Roland Freisler. But we never really know where this dowdy university student found the courage to speak out against the Holocaust, while so many other Germans were too chicken or too blinded by love for their Führer.

But these unanswered questions in no way diminish the power of the story or Jentsch’s performance. Germany’s rising star (The Edukators, The Downfall) has won several best actress awards at various European film fests for her sobering portrayal, and rightfully so. After all, it’s her gripping delivery that makes this homage so inspiring—despite its limited scope.

Sophie Scholl: The Final Days opens Friday, April 21

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