Killing Hitler 3 x 44 & 1 x 90
Killing Hitler reveals the stories of those who attempted to assassinate Adolf Hitler, featuring new scientific evidence, rare archive, and in-depth analysis. The series combines personal tales of bravery with the suspense of assassination attempts, detailing the devices and plans used, the motives and mindsets of the would-be assassins, and how Hitler and his security responded.
Through scientific reconstruction, we accurately re-create and test the devices used in the attempts to kill Hitler and the top Nazis. We reconstruct controlled explosions using the same materials and detonate them filmed on high-speed camera technology at dedicated scientific establishments.
Episode 1: The Lone Wolves
Experts reveal, in-depth, the lone wolf assassination attempts on Adolf Hitler. The stories of Georg Elser and Maurice Bavaud show just how close these dedicated individuals got to killing Hitler with detailed scientific and dramatic recreations and rare archive. Yet, piercing Hitler’s sophisticated security system would need a new breed of assassins.
Episode 2: The Rise of The Resistance
From the Lone Wolves to the organised resistance movements in Poland and Czechoslovakia The successful assassination of Hitler’s right hand man, Reinhard Heydrich, in 1942 gave the resistance the impetus it needed to get more organized within Germany. Hans Oster, Deputy Chief of Intelligence and right-hand man to Hitler was to become the surprising organiser of the Resistance, he was the ideal mole, a ring master orchestrating numerous attempts on Hitler. The Fall of Stalingrad provides a key the opportunity to kill Hitler, he is at his weakest point. Senior German officers plot to kill Hitler through daring clandestine operations such as the Plane or Brandy Bomb attempt to blow Hitler out of the sky on a flight to the Russian Front, this was swiftly followed by the Suicide Vest attempt and the Blond Bomber attempt in November 1943. We show through controlled explosion testing and slow-motion filming, how Fabien von Schlabrendorff and Henning von Tresckow’s ingenious brandy bomb would have killed Hitler in March 1943, if their knowledge of bomb fuses had been better.
Episode 3: Killers From Within
By now Hitler’s Bloodhounds, the secret police and investigators, are hot on the heels of the resistance, some resistors are caught, tortured others are executed by the guillotine or hung on meat hooks in the notorious Plotzensee prison in Berlin. We follow the buildup to the 20th July Plot in 1944 and investigate in detail the location of the bombing attempt on Hitler at the Wolf’s Lair in Eastern Prussia. The last-minute change from the concrete bunker to a wooden cabin for Stauffenberg’s meeting with Hitler was to have a significant effect on the power of the bomb used. We show that if Claus von Stauffenberg had the explosives he originally intended, had met Hitler in the concrete bunker as planned and his briefcase containing his bomb had not been moved 10 cms from where he placed it, Hitler would have died on July 20th 1944, and millions of lives would have been saved.
Contributors:
Heike Görtemaker, Journalist & Historian
Prof. Stephan Malinowski, University of Edinburgh Prof. Winfried Heineman, Author and Historian
Valerie Riedesal, Granddaughter of Resistance member and author
Annette von Schlabrendorff, Journalist and Granddaughter
Dr Johannes Tuchel, Director of the German Resistance Memorial Centre
Konstanz von Schulthess, Daughter of Claus von Stauffenberg
Sir Richard Evans
Dr Alexandra Richie.
Prof Richard Overy Randall Hansen
Dr Paul Moore
Roland Alford:Explosives Engineer
Filmed on Location in Berlin, Zurich, Warsaw, Canada and London
A Mooonbase Alpha Films/ Wavelength Entertainment Production - 2025