Swing Kids

In late-1930s Hamburg, a group of teenage friends obsessed with American swing music and dancing try to maintain their carefree subculture while pressured to join the Hitler Youth. As Nazi conformity tightens around them, their friendship fractures under political and personal strain.

The 'Swingjugend' were real youth subcultures in Nazi Germany who embraced swing music and Anglo-American fashion as a form of quiet nonconformity, drawing suspicion and eventually persecution from Nazi authorities who viewed the culture as degenerate.

The specific characters and plot are fictional, though the Swing Kids subculture and its persecution are historically documented.

Directed by Thomas Carter

Cast: Robert Sean Leonard, Christian Bale, Frank Whaley, Barbara Hershey

Positioned at 1939 within the Prewar Nazi Germany phase of the war, as part of the Nazi youth culture. This is entry 12 of 150 in the chronological archive.

• Swingjugend
• Hitler Youth
• Nazi Germany
• youth subculture

• 

  The Book Thief

  1938–1943

• 

  Mrs. Miniver

  1939–1940

• 

  Schindler's List

  1939–1945

• 

  The Pianist

  1939–1945

• 

  From Here to Eternity

  Summer 1941 – 7 December 1941

• 

  Since You Went Away

  1943–1944