Fatherland is the adaptation of the Robert Harris bestseller which takes place in an alternate history. Where the Nazis were triumphant in the second world war.

In this timeline, we begin in Nazi Germany in the run up to Adolf Hitler's 75th birthday. The plot follows detective Xavier March (Rutger Hauer) investigating the suspicious death of a high-ranking Nazi.

March meets with Charlie Maguire (Miranda Richardson) a visiting female US journalist who is mixed up with another murder and is determined to investigate the case and teams up with March. It looks like the victims were high ranking Nazi officials who decades ago were involved in planning the Holocaust.

Rutger Hauer and Miranda Richardson are good in the lead roles. There is a roll call of British character actors in this HBO film from Michael Kitchen, Peter Vaughan, John Shrapnel and Jean Marsh making a chilling cameo.

Some of the actors are though are wasted in their brief roles.

The film was shot in Prague and visual effects were used to make it look like a triumphant Berlin. The adaptation gets rid of some of the nuances and side plots of the Harris novel such as a Nazi era European Union.

It becomes a staid thriller where someone wishes to keep the secrets of the past to remain hidden.

In doing so what made the book standout has gone. What we have is a standard, made for television thriller that is nothing out of the ordinary.

I read the Robert Harris' novel, which this Tv movie is very close to. In the line of what the American political thrillers of the seventies brought to us: for instance PARALLAX VIEW. Instead of Kennedy assassination, the topic is set in a Germany that won WW2. And the lead investigator character is a SS officer !!! He has the same role that Yves Montand had in I COMME ICARE, or Warren Beatty in PARALLAX VIEW. That's the first time in the movie history that a SS is shown as a "good" guy, a hero. After all, for an uchronia, it is so believable, so terrific. In France, you had a politician whose death was very similar to the murder case that begins this film: Robert Boulin. But that's another story.

Robert Harris's other novels have made a good transition onto the screen. "Enigma" worked well because of its top-notch cast and careful recreation of WWII England. "Archangel" was an above-average TV movie because of its compelling subject matter. "Fatherland" fell flat because it was poorly cast and made on a microscopic budget.

Despite their pedigree and talent, many of the cast are clearly uncomfortable in their roles. Rutger Hauer and Michael Kitchen should have swapped scripts and Miranda Richardson should have called for a taxi. She's a very good actor but completely fails to convince as an American journalist who dresses like a 60-year-old whore.

The plot is edited down to its bare bones and loses a lot of its impact in the process of being filleted. The screenplay spends far too long looking behind the shiny Nazi facade, creating an expectation of bad things about to happen far too early in its running time. Bled of all its suspense, "Fatherland" limps toward a predictable climax, robbing the story of any historical relevance or impact.

There are strong similarities between "Fatherland" and "Archangel", with their stories of past events influencing the present and old ghosts that refuse to lie still, but "Fatherland" has "EPIC" stamped all over it. A story about an enduring Nazi Europe in the 1960s can't be told against a backdrop of dodgy mattes with approximately 30 extras for the crowd scenes. If ever a movie deserved to be recast and remade for substantially more than 50 quid, "Fatherland" is that movie.

The Hollywood Suits should hang their heads in shame for not recognising a fantastic story and giving it to someone like Steven Spielberg.