Review: 'Escape From Germany' finds faith-supporting lessons in a story of Latter-day Saint missionaries far from home at the brink of war

Few artists have expressed their faith through their work the way Utah filmmaker T.C. Christensen does — and the Latter-day Saint themes of such movies as “The Fighting Preacher,” “Love, Kennedy,” “The Cokeville Miracle,” “Ephraim’s Rescue” and “17 Miracles” are strong and heartfelt.

The same is true for Christensen’s latest, “Escape From Germany,” in which Christensen — as director, screenwriter and cinematographer — recounts a little-known moment of pre-World War II history as a story of faith and perseverance. As with many of Christensen’s movies, the faithful will enjoy it more than the rest of us.

It’s late August 1939, and Heber J. Grant, then president and prophet of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, has a missionary, Elder Barnes (Landon Henneman), deliver a message to the U.S. consul in Stuttgart: Get out of Germany, because Hitler is about to order the invasion of Poland. The consul says the military experts at the U.S. embassy in Berlin don’t see that happening, and Barnes points out that Grant is a prophet, so his intel may be better than the military’s.

From this point, the word goes out from the mission headquarters across Germany to evacuate all missionaries to Belgium or Denmark quickly, before the Nazis close the borders and the war begins. Mission President Wood (David McConnell) in Stuttgart has a risky assignment for one missionary, Elder Norman Seibold (Paul Wuthrich) — travel alone across Germany to round up the 20 or so stray missionaries who have been abandoned in towns and train stations, and get them tickets out of the country. 

While Seibold takes on this difficult and dangerous mission, President Wood and Elder Barnes pack up their bags and their families to get to a safe harbor. This becomes an unlikely adventure, particularly when Wood has to take some drastic and not particularly legal actions along the way.

Adapting a historical novel, “Mine Angels Round About,” by Terry Bohle Montague, Christensen generates some satisfying tension in Seibold’s seemingly impossible search and the Wood family’s breakneck rush to get out of the country. Along the way, there are nods to the bigger story going on around them — such as the recurring encounters with a Jewish family desperately trying to leave Germany. 

Not all the references are so welcome, like how one missionary regularly references to Hitler’s admiration of the church’s dietary restrictions and genealogical studies — which are true, but they’re not the flex the character thinks they are. 

The standouts among the ensemble cast are McConnell as the down-to-earth mission president and Wuthrich as the stalwart Seibold, a rugged hero in a surprisingly well-tailored missionary suit. (Wuthrich is familiar to fans of Latter-day Saint movies, having played the church’s founder, Joseph Smith, in the 2021 drama “Witnesses.”) 

The movie was shot in Budapest and in the Salt Lake City area, and it’s a tribute to Christensen’s ability to stretch his budget that his team dresses up the Heber Valley Railroad to look convincingly like a 1939-era European train.

Unfortunately, Christensen’s habit of turning every plot turn into a Sunday school lesson is also on display here — with every twist of fate or fortunate coincidence taken as a sign of God’s hand at work. Miracles are good for sermons, but they make for unsubtle screenwriting.

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‘Escape From Germany’

★★1/2

Opens Friday, April 12, at theaters across Utah. Rated PG for thematic material and brief violence. Running time: 97 minutes.