Set in 1916, the film offered up a highly fictionised version of the death of the British War Secretary, Field Marshal Herbert Kitchener aboard the cruiser HMS Hampshire, on his way to Russia.

A successful U-boat ace, Helmut Liers, lives in the fictional north German town of Meerskirchen with his mother, who has already lost two sons in the war.

[5] The Majorin (Lier's mother), tries to get him a shore assignment, which he blocks, saying that he will fight on until Germany either wins the war or he dies, and then goes out to sea on his latest mission.

[6] In the second part of the film, the German Navy learns that a very important British military leader-who is not named in the film, but is clearly meant to be Kitchener-has boarded a cruiser taking him to Arkhangelsk, leading Liers and his U-boat being sent out to essentially assassinate him by sinking the cruiser, a task which is performed successfully (in reality, the Hampshire was sunk by a mine laid by an U-boat, but not in a torpedo attack).

[7] Afterwards, a Q ship (a disguised British merchant cruiser), which illegally flies the flag of neutral Denmark, ambushes Liers's submarine, which is badly damaged.

[9] The film ends with Liers boarding a new submarine to once again go out to continue the war at sea with the last shot being a close-up of the Imperial German Navy Ensign, which flutters proudly in the wind.

[15] The script was for Morgenrot was written by Gerhard Menzel, a successful writer from Silesia who had won the Kleist prize for the best new German play in 1927, who was also a Nazi party member.

At the time that Morgenrot went into production, the NSDAP and the DNVP were enemies, but Hugenberg knew a strong showing by his party might change Hitler's attitude.

[20] Much of what can be described as Morgenrot's pro-death message with its portrayal of death in war as noble, honorable and even erotic was intended as a sort of rebuttal to the mutinous sailors of the High Seas Fleet.

[28] On the other hand, the Majorin refuses to rejoice over her son's success in sinking the cruiser and with it Lord Kitchener because of the suffering of war, saying that the men abroad the Hampshire also had families-a theme that would not appear in Nazi film.

[35] Rayner described the film's message as: "The crew's kinship, maintained up and beyond death, surpasses emotional connections on the shore, and compels the German sailors to honor the dead members of the shipboard family in ceaseless service".

[36] Through the film ends in 1916, but the devotion to duty showed by Liers and his crew stands in marked contrast to the sailors of the High Seas Fleet who mutinied in 1918.

[42] By contrast, Liers with his love of action and violence together with a general contempt for human life represents the hard, ruthless "New Man" spawned by the war, who for his all rough edges and todessehnsucht paradoxically does the necessary toughness to survive.

[53] The film generated much controversy in Britain in 1933 where reviewers were quick to notice that the unnamed British military leader who goes down on a cruiser on his way to Russia was meant to be Kitchener.

[58] The prime minister, Ramsay MacDonald, was unwilling to have such a protest being and the Foreign Secretary, Sir John Simon, found himself during the debates in the House of Commons "...in the rather odd position of having to defend a Nazi film".