U-96, The True Story of ‘Das Boot’

Today, 80 years after the events and 40 years after the film, these images and testimonies shed an unexpected light on the reality of the fiction filmed by Petersen. The international success of the film Das Boot made the U-96, of which it fictionally recounts the 7th combat patrol at sea, the most famous of all Hitler’s submarines and arguably one of the most famous movie submarines. But the true story of this extraordinary submarine and its equally exceptional crew goes far beyond fiction. Knowing that the success of Das Boot not only opened the doors of Hollywood to Wolfgang Petersen, but also made this film an absolute reference from which all submarine warfare films produced by American cinema were subsequently inspired, this opens ultimately the way to a broader reflection on the indirect, even unconscious relationship that exists between the power of the images of Hitler’s propaganda and that of today’s Hollywood cinema.