Hotel Terminus: The Life and Times of Klaus Barbie

This typically long (267 minutes!) and very thorough Marcel Ophuls documentary traces the life--both as Nazi official and fugitive from justice--of accused war criminal Klaus Barbie. Produced in Paris, the film for the most part, avoids the standard shots of Nazi atrocities in favor of a murder-mystery approach. Ophuls himself appears as a sort of detective, ferreting out information about Barbie from associates, officials and victims. The director has noted that he was deliberately patterning the film after the popular American TV series Columbo; he even wears a battered raincoat in some scenes. Hotel Terminus: The Life & Times of Klaus Barbie won a 1988 Academy Award for best documentary.