History Film / Sterne

* ShooTheShaggyDog: Walter arranges for Ruth to be smuggled in time before she gets on the train for Auschwitz, [[spoiler: but Kurt foils his plan lying about the train's scheduled departure. However, Ruth didn't even want to be saved, since she consciously chose to follow her people until the very end.]]

* [[SurprisinglyGoodForeignLanguage Surprisingly Good Bulgarian]]: One can discern a lot of Walter's character simply by the fact that he has gone to the trouble of picking up some Bulgarian.

* OnlyKnownByTheirNickname: The partisans never learn "Walter"'s real name, and so refer to him by an apparently randomly chosen pseudonym, or as "the Corporal". His fellow Germans call him Rembrandt for his interest in painting.

* IsThatWhatTheyreCallingItNow: Kurt doesn't buy that Walter and Ruth are just walking and talking all the time.
** The other Jewish inmates are assuming the same, and thinking that Ruth is one of LesCollaborateurs.

* FalseReassurance: The Jews are told that in Poland they will work in vegetable garden, but very few of them are buying it.

* FreudianSlip: Kurt, who has been in Auschwitz, says that it's "a mill for human flesh", unwittingly acknowledging that [[CaptainObvious Jews are in fact people]].

* MeaningfulEcho: When the protagonists are talking about stars and men Ruth says "Every human being has got a protective star in the sky, but once you rip it off from its place, Man can do nothing but perish". [[spoiler: And simbolically, when Walter finds at the station her ripped off yellow star [[TearJerker everybody know what it means]].]]

* TheReasonYouSuckSpeech: At their first meeting, Ruth asks Walter to bring a doctor for a woman in travail, but Walter declines, not wanting to be involved with these people. Ruth tells him he's not a human being, and the Germans are all the same. Walter feels profound shame, and comes back with a doctor.
* RewatchBonus: In the beginning there's Ruth looking around as if she's looking for someone. It's clear that she was longing to say goodbye to Walter [[spoiler: but Kurt tricked him in not showing up.]]

* ShellShockedVeteran: Walter, who was previously stationed at Leningrad, shows signs of this. His DespairSpeech about human kind is probably generated by the horrors he witnessed.

* [[SurprisinglyGoodForeignLanguage Surprisingly Good Bulgarian]]: One can discern a lot of Walter's character simply by the fact that has gone to the trouble of picking up some Bulgarian.
%%* TooGoodForThisSinfulEarth: [[spoiler: Ruth and the other Jews.]]

* InfantImmortality: Obviously averted. Ruth's pupils will be deported with her at the beginning. And the child delivered in the camp is stated to be dead hours after his birth.

* DespairSpeech: Walter believes (not unreasonably) that with this war millions of years of evolution are being thrown away, and the man is again a chimpanzee.

* IsThatWhatTheyreCallingItNow: Kurt doesn't buy that Walter and Ruth are just walking and talking.

* DownerBeginning: The beginning shiws that all the people in the camp are not going to be saved.

* YiddishAsASecondLanguage: {{Averted}}. The Jews are Sephardic and speak a dialect of Judeo-Spanish or Ladino, the Mediterranean equivalent of Yiddish [[note]] bothe Yiddish and Judeo-Spanish derived from the Middle-age version of German and Spanish and are still mutual intelligible [[/note]]

* IsThatWhatTheyreCallingItNow: Kurt doesn't buy that Walter and Ruth are just WalkingAndTalking.

* IsThatWhatTheyreCallingItNow: Kurt doesn't buy that Walter and Ruth are just Walking and talking.

* {{Schoolmarm}}: Ruth is a school teacher.

* KickTheDog: Kurt's writes he's lied about Ruth's deportation on Walter's portrait of Ruth.

* MeaningfulEcho: When the protagonists are talking about stars and men Ruth says "Every human being has got a protective star in the sky, but once you rip it off from its place, Man can do nothing but perish". [[spoiler: And simbolically, when Walter finds at the station her ripped of yellow star [[TearJerker everybody know what does it mean]]. ]]
* OnlyKnownByTheirNickname: The partisans never learn "Walter"'s real name, and so refer to him by an apparently randomly chosen pseudonym, or as "the Corporal".

* DespairSpeech: Walter believes (not unreasonably) that with this war millions of years of evolution are being obliterated, and the man is again a chimpanzee.

* DespairSpeech: Walter is fond of these.

* FalseReassurance:
** The
* FauxAffablyEvil: We first see Kurt coming to the aid of a tired Jewish woman - by gently lifting her child onto a cattle car for her.