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The Third Option


            This German film, set in June of 1914, puts a different spin on the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, which ultimately led to World War I. The official version of the assassination points directly to six Bosnian Serb separatists, followed by details of their involvement with the Serbian military and government. This movie poses a different hypothesis.Parts of Bosnia have been annexed by the Austrian empire, including the city of Sarajevo. Austria maintains an occupying force in the city, but life goes on for it's residents before the assassination. Dr. Leo Pfiffer, a district magistrate for the Austrian government in Sarajevo, but ethnically Hungarian and Jewish, is assigned to interrogate the assassins. He is initially convinced that the Serbian government ordered the assassination in order to take back Bosnia and other parts of Serbia annexed by Austria. However, he begins to suspect that the six young assassins were only part of a small, local nationalist group without ties to the Serbian government. In interrogation by Dr. Phiffer, they are unable to describe their journeys from Serbia across the mountains into Sarajevo - something they had supposedly confessed to the Austrian police. Dr. Phiffer also questions why there were only 36 policemen present in Sarajevo on the day of a royal procession by the Archduke, the heir to the Austrian throne, and why the parade route was published in the newspapers. considering the politically charged atmosphere in Sarajevo.Dr. Phiffer continues down a dark path, meeting up with shadowy figures from both Austria and Germany. He concludes that the young assassins were acting alone, while being unwitting pawns in a game played by wealthy industrialists with plans to build a railroad from Berlin to Baghdad, crossing Serbia. In addition, Austria and Germany use the opportunity to secure Serbia for themselves as a buffer against possible threats with Russia. The further down he goes, the more he comes to realize that the military might of Germany set the assassination plot in motion, sacrificing Archduke Ferdinand in order to justify their immediate annexation of Serbia. In a closing scene, Dr. Pfiffer is informed by a German military doctor with whom he formed a friendship, that Germany intended to overtake Paris within a month.There is a romance between Dr. Pfiffer and a wealthy Serbian heiress who was living with her father in Sarajevo. They become lovers, only to find out that she is married to a man in Paris. She and her father are forced to return to Paris to escape the incoming German army.Dr. Pfiffer is brilliantly played by Florian Teichtmeister, and Austrian actor. The movie is in both German and Serbian languages with English subtitles.
    

Christoph Bittenauer

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