Der Todestunnel, known in Italian as 1200º: La Verita della Tunnel della Morte is a joint production television movie

Television movie

A television film is a feature film that is a television program produced for and originally distributed by a television network, in contrast to...

 filmed in Austria

Austria

Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...

 and Italy

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

, and has both Austrian and Italian actor

Actor

An actor is a person who acts in a dramatic production and who works in film, television, theatre, or radio in that capacity...

s speaking in their native languages.

Plot

The film opens up as a young prosecutor is handed her toughest assignment: a truck driver

Truck driver

A truck driver , is a person who earns a living as the driver of a truck, usually a semi truck, box truck, or dump truck.Truck drivers provide an essential service to...

 charged with reckless driving

Reckless driving

Reckless driving is a major moving traffic violation. As a legal term, it is used within the United States. This offence has been abolished in the United Kingdom and replaced...

. She has to prove that he was negligent and kept falling asleep at the wheel. After crashing his semi

Semi

Semi- is a Latin prefix to a verb, noun, or adjective meaning "half". Some compounds formed with it are often abbreviated to simply "semi" in appropriate contexts:...

 into a sports car

Sports car

A sports car is a small, usually two seat, two door automobile designed for high speed driving and maneuverability....

, his rig turns over, gas starts leaking out and a fire ensues, shutting down the lights in the long tunnel. Unfortunately, due to the long size of the tunnel, or tube as it is known , it was impossible for rescue personnel to get in the tunnel to give adequate medical attention to the people seriously injured. There are several flashback

Flashback (narrative)

Flashback is an interjected scene that takes the narrative back in time from the current point the story has reached. Flashbacks are often used to recount events that happened before the story’s primary sequence of events or to fill in crucial backstory...

s, where survivors recall the accident, including a grieving father named Giuseppe Paoletti, portrayed by Flavio Insinna

Flavio Insinna

Flavio Insinna is an Italian actor and television presenter. From 2006 - 2008 he presented Affari Tuoi, the Italian version of Deal or No Deal.-Biography:Flavio was born in Rome...

, an Italian family man who is driving his wife and son to Austria, who emotionally describes his account of what happened after the accident. There are several twists and turns throughout the story.

Two versions

There are two different versions of the film. Der Todestunnel, the original title, is filmed in German with the Italian actors' voices dubbed, and in the Italian version, 1200º: La Verita della Tunnel della morte the opposite is true.

Background

The movie is based on a true story about a catastrophic accident which takes place inside the tunnel connecting Austria and Italy. As a result, at least 50 people died of smoke inhalation.