"You Jews. Tricks and fakeries. It's what you're good at." Stefan Ruzowitzky's The Counterfeiters is not for the faint of heart. Austria's Oscar winning war-thriller has an unwavering devotion to a clear voice, which excites and disgusts in equal measure. Shortly after WW2 on the beach at Monte Carlo, Salomon Sorowitsch (a screen-grabbing Karl Markovics) is about to spend up large. The next ninety minutes explores how a Jewish criminal and concentration-camp inmate wound up here with a case full of cash. The description "fascinating" undersells the story.

Operation Bernhard was a Nazi scheme to ruin the economies of Britain and the US with a flood of counterfeit currency. They needed a good forger, and in Jewish prisoner "Sally" Sorowitsch they had "the most charming scoundrel in Germany". Under Sturmbannfhrer Herzog's (Devid Striesow) watchful eye, Sal and a group of erstwhile printers were seconded to do the dirty work. So good was their labour - the largest counterfeiting operation in history - that they were rewarded for duping the Bank Of England with a ping-pong table. "One adapts or dies," explains Sal to a principled inmate, disgusted that Jews were aiding the Nazi war.

An overwhelming claustrophobia surrounds writer/director Ruzowitzky's elegant script and opulent shoot. The effect is truly powerful, as he examines an ocean of guilt through which Sally must navigate - for helping the Nazis, for his privileged position, for being alive. It's a heady brew that challenges divisive morality and the ambiguity of survival. It even manages to shock - now a rare quality in the well-mined theatre of war films. Anchored by Markovics' wiry, angular performance, and an insistent tango score that gets to the bones of the film, The Counterfeiters ranks among the greats.