After volunteering in the Winter War against the Soviets in Finland, Max Manus, Aksel Hennie, returns to a Norway occupied by the Nazis and joins the Norwegian resistance, taking part in the fight against the German occupation by helping produce illegal propaganda. His cell is soon detected, and he is arrested after leaping out a window. Hospitalised, he manages a daring escape to Scotland, where he receives British Commando training in sabotage and disinformation, sharpening the skills that will define his wartime work.
Back in Norway with his friend Gregers Gram, Nicolai Cleve Broch, Manus launches his first mission: an audacious attack on German supply ships that proves spectacularly successful. The operation draws the attention of the local Gestapo chief, Siegfried Fehmer, Ken Duken, and Manus soon becomes a high-value target. Yet he avoids capture, and, together with Gram and Gunnar Sønsteby, forms the so‑called “Oslo Gang,” a tight-knit cell that carries out daring acts and earns a medal from the Norwegian king, Kong Haakon VII, Stig Hoffmeyer, for their bravery and contribution to the resistance.
Stockholm, a neutral hub that becomes a meeting point for Norwegians in allied service, plays a crucial role in Manus’s story. Here Gram introduces Manus to “Tikken”, Agnes Kittelsen Lindebrække, a married woman who works as a Norwegian contact for the British consulate, and the two develop a complicated and intimate relationship. As the war grows harsher, Manus watches many friends fall, and he begins to carry a heavy burden of survivor’s guilt, questioning why he lived when so many others did not.
The war’s tempo accelerates toward its end. On 16 January 1945, Manus and Roy Nielsen, Pål Sverre Hagen, plant limpet mines that lead to the sinking of the cargo ship Donau the following day, a mission that epitomizes the sabotage undertakings that helped tilt the balance in favor of the Allies. The daring raid reinforces Manus’s reputation among resistance circles and in the broader narrative of Norwegian resistance.
In the aftermath, with prospects uncertain and the future unclear, Manus encounters an imprisoned Fehmer once more and confronts a stark, unvarnished truth: war creates victims and meaning—if it exists at all—often remains elusive long after the fighting stops. The story closes on a note of quiet reflection, acknowledging the personal toll of wartime heroism and the lingering ache of a conflict that reshaped a nation and its people.
