Die Brücke (English: The Bridge) is a 1959 West German anti-war film directed by Austrian filmmaker Bernhard Wicki.

The story was based on an actual event, upon the personal report of a surviving veteran who in his own youth experienced a similar situation in World War II.

In the town's school, seven boys—each about 16 years old—are oblivious to the seriousness and dangers of the war, feeling excitement about how close the fighting is getting to them, and they live their lives as normally as they can, though they are overshadowed with personal problems: Karl, who has a crush on his hairstylist father's young assistant, is shocked to see them in an intimate situation; Klaus is oblivious to the affections of his classmate Franziska; and Walter is deeply resentful of his father, the local Nazi Party Ortsgruppenleiter, who has chosen to save his own skin under the pretense of an important Volkssturm meeting.

Unexpectedly, the boys are recruited into a local army unit, but after only one day in the barracks, the commanding officers receive news that the Americans are approaching, and the garrison is called out.

As they prepare to move out, the Kompaniechef, who has been asked by the boys' teacher to keep them out of action, arranges for the youths to be placed in 'defense' of the local bridge (which is strategically unimportant, and which is to be blown up anyway to spare the town the direct effects of the war), under the command of a veteran Unteroffizier.

Dawn comes, and with it an American fighter plane which fires its machine guns at the bridge, killing the youngest of their number, Sigi, who refused to take cover because he had previously been teased for his alleged lack of bravery.

Realizing that his friends have died in vain, Hans goes mad with disbelief and despair, threatening the engineer with his rifle, and as the Feldwebel in turn readies his gun, he is shot from behind by Albert.

The remaining engineers withdraw with a final burst of submachine gun fire that kills Hans, leaving only a traumatized Albert to return home.