Germany fetes Red Baron hero as film opens in Berlin

Berlin rolled out the red carpet last night for a World War One hero - the legendary Red Baron who downed 80 Allied planes before being shot down on April 21, 1918 by a Canadian pilot, Roy Brown. The occasion was the premiere of a new German-made film, Der Rote Baron, and among the guests were the actors Matthias Schweighoefer (pictured), who stars as Baron von Richthofen, and Joseph Fiennes, who plays Brown.

But if there are no great crowds in Potsdamer Platz it was because the Red Baron is not well known in Germany, where there's a still a taboo about glorifying anyone connected with either World War - even a young aristocrat (only 25 when he died) who, while proud of his 'kills', saw aerial warfare as a dignified sport.

The film includes the famous scene that personifies the Red Baron's behaviour. Engaged in a dogfight with a British fighter pilot, the Red Baron spots that his adversary's gun has jammed. He immediately disengages and forces the British pilot to land so that he can shake his hand. "Our task is to bring down airplanes, not men, we are sportsmen not butchers," Baron von Richthofen says in the film.

It is the fact that Red Baron can be celebrated without embarrassment that made the £14m film possible in a country where 'war movies' are rare." There are strong voices in Germany that still say we should not be doing this," said Nikolai Mullerschon, who wrote and directed the film. However, he added: "The film makes a clear statement against war. Richthofen says that the world has been turned into a slaughterhouse."

Members of the Prussian Von Richtofen clan attended the premiere. The British actress Lena Headey, star of television's Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, who plays a German nurse - the love interest - in the film, was unable to attend. There is no date yet for a British opening.