Submarine - Recap

Jim picks up his briefing at a warehouse office and is informed that the IMF must break Kruger Schtelman, who has been in prison for 25 years in the Eastern European Republic and is the only one who knows the hidden location of a horde of World War II Nazi treasure. He is due to be released in two days and plans to use the cash to finance a neo-Nazi movement.

Jim assembles the usual team plus agent Tracey and Carella and Somers of the Hartford Repertory Company. Jim warns them that Colonel Jaroslav Sardner has been assigned by the EER to break the proud Schtelman and has had no luck. They go over the route between Sardner’s headquarters and Schtelman’s prison where he is taken back and forth each day, and note that there is only one route they can take back to the prison.

Sardner holds an interrogation with Schtelman, first trying to bribe him and then threaten him. The haughty Schtelman still claims to know nothing of the treasure and Sardner sends him back. En route, Jim and Paris dress as monks and block Schtelman’s car in the middle, then drop some boxes. The escort guards on either side see a truck with a monk picking up boxes and assume they’re seeing the same truck. In the middle, Tracey uses a gas gun to knock out Schtelman and his guards. The team escapes with Schtelman while the escort soldiers finally catch on. The IMF then makes it appears as if they’ve driven off in the car while hiding Schtelman in a nearby warehouse. Sardner calculates how far they could have driven and orders an outward search.

Schtelman wakes up onboard a submarine with an aged Tracey, who is rambling incoherently. Schtelman goes outside and confronts Jim as the captain of the SS U-Boat. Jim is unimpressed with Schtelman and checks on Tracey, while Paris arrives as an SS officer who is at odds with Jim. They inform Schtelman he is being taken to SS headquarters where he and Tracey will be put on trial for giving information to Sardner. Tracey seemingly dies and Jim has her ejected in a torpedo tube… where it becomes clear the entire “submarine” is a mock-up in the warehouse.

Schtelman grabs Paris’ gun and demands answers, forcing Paris to show his (carefully faked) SS tattoo. Jim is regular Germany Navy and unimpressed with the SS aboard “his” sub. Schtelman is sure that he never broke and the SS trial will determine that, and gives them the gun. Barney then uses special effects to stage a depth charge attacked, launched from an EER destroyer. Jim orders the sub to go to the bottom but they start to take “damage” and he kills his crew one by one. Finally he orders Schtelman and Paris to put disposable items in the ejection tube to make it appear that they were destroyed. Jim then orders Paris into the tube to provide a body to make it more convincing to the destroyer captain (and Schtelman).

Jim and Schtelman now prepare to evacuate the sub, but Jim warns the elderly Schtelman that he is unlikely to survive the ascent to the surface. Schtelman insists that the SS find out he never broke, and as Jim departs, Schtelman screams the bank account numbers of the treasure. Sardner has finally realized that they never left the area and is closing in, so the IMF dress in military uniforms, play a tape recording of gunshots, and fake Paris being shot. They leave to take him to the hospital while Sardner comes into the warehouse and finds the submarine mock-up. Schtelman emerges, realizes he’s been tricked, and congratulate Sardner on breaking him. Sardner, realizing they’ve both been fooled, begins to laugh as he orders his men to take Schtelman away.

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