Director: Todd Komarnicki
A theologian who once preached against violence finds himself drawn into a plot against Hitler, and Bonhoeffer: Pastor. Spy. Assassin. spends its 132 minutes tracing that reversal.
What is Bonhoeffer Pastor Spy Assassin about?
The film follows Dietrich Bonhoeffer from pulpit to underground network, showing a man whose faith initially points him toward pacifism and away from any political entanglement. As Nazi Germany tightens its grip and the machinery of genocide becomes impossible to ignore, Bonhoeffer starts moving through double lives: preaching openly while passing information and shelter to those the regime hunts. His path eventually crosses a circle of military officers and intelligence figures plotting to remove Hitler by force, and the film treats his decision to join them as a genuine crisis of conscience rather than an easy call. Prison sequences late in the film slow the pace deliberately, letting the weight of the choice settle rather than rushing toward a conventional thriller climax. Todd Komarnicki structures the film as a character study first, with the espionage plotting serving that portrait rather than the reverse.
Cast & crew
Jonas Dassler plays Bonhoeffer with a stillness that makes his rare outbursts land hard, while August Diehl and Moritz Bleibtreu bring practiced menace and moral compromise to the officers around him. David Jonsson and Phileas Heyblom round out a supporting cast that gives the underground network a lived-in, improvised feel rather than movie-plot polish.
Context & significance
A Belgian-Irish co-production released in 2024, the film draws on Bonhoeffer's own writings and the historical record of the July 1944 conspiracy against Hitler, subjects that have been documented extensively in biography and film before but rarely centered so squarely on the theological argument behind the decision to act. Its 132-minute runtime keeps most of the tension internal, built from letters, sermons, and prison conversations rather than large-scale set pieces.
Where & how to watch
Bonhoeffer: Pastor. Spy. Assassin. is available on K-Time with Persian dubbing and Persian subtitles, letting viewers follow the film's dense historical dialogue comfortably in Farsi. Anyone can read this page without an account, but watching the film itself requires logging into K-Time, where the whole viewing experience is designed around Persian-speaking audiences.