Nuremberg seemed well positioned to be a big part of the 2026 Oscars race before it was released in theaters in November 2025. Not only did it star two decorated Best Actor winners (Russell Crowe, Rami Malek), but its subject matter and setting — a World War II tribunal wherein some of history’s most egregious criminals are put on trial — is the kind of thing that the Academy voters have long gravitated towards during awards season. (Case in point: Judgment At Nuremberg, which covers similar ground, won the Oscar for Best Picture back in 1962.)
Well, for whatever reason, Nuremberg failed to make a splash at either the box office or the awards race — it ended up receiving zero 2026 Oscar nominations — but that hasn’t stopped it from making a big impression on Netflix subscribers. The movie, which follows psychiatrist Douglas Kelley (Malek) as he determines whether former Nazi commander Hermann Göring (Crowe) is fit to stand trial at the world’s first international tribunal, quickly made its way into the upper reaches of the Netflix Top 10 after hitting the service on March 7, 2026. But how much of the movie is fact, and how much is fiction? Don’t worry, Decider’s got your back.
Yes, the movie is based on the Nuremberg trials, an international criminal tribunal held from 1945 to 1946 that sought to punish Nazi leaders for war crimes carried out across Europe during WWII. It’s based on author Jack El-Hai’s 2013 non-fiction book The Nazi And The Psychiatrist, which is currently sitting as the #1 bestseller in Amazon’s World War II history section.
The trials were held just six months after Germany unconditionally surrendered to the Allied powers; 24 defendants were tried with charges such as conspiracy, crimes against humanity, and mass murder. Kelley, who at the time was a US Army psychiatrist, was assigned to examine 22 of the highest-ranking individuals of the Nazi party. Among his patients were Göring and Rudolf Hess, who is played by German actor Andreas Pietschmann.
In terms of accuracy, the movie does a good job in including moments that were present during the real trials.
For example, in one scene, the courtroom is shown footage of concentration camps. This actually happens at the trials: according to a 1945 United Press International article, one defendant, Hans Frank, “got sick” while the footage was being shown, although this was not depicted in the movie.
The footage shown in the movie is also the real footage shown at the trials: Nazi Concentration Camps was a 52-minute film featuring footage taken by Allied photographers as they made their way to Nazi Germany. It was presented as evidence during the trials and was considered a turning point in the trials.
“The images you are about to see have never before been shown in public,” says U.S. Chief Prosecutor Robert Jackson (Michael Shannon), as the lights in the courtroom shut off so the defendants and jury can see what the words “concentration camp” meant.
Director James Vanderbilt asked the cast not to do any research for the scene in order to capture raw reactions to the horrifying footage played in the courtroom.
“Honestly, that was the hardest day on set. But I think it was an essential thing for us to do. And I wanted the audience to have the same experience the people in the courtroom did that day,” Vanderbilt said to RogerEbert.com.
Other details, like the fact that Kelley grew close to Göring and his family, are also true. In 2011, El-Hai wrote that the psychiatrist personally delivered letters to the war criminal’s family, developing a bond between the two men.
El-Hai’s book and real-life documentation lends a lot to the writing and portrayal of the characters, leaving the movie with a generally accurate depiction of a historically significant event.
