Der Untergang

[DrTeeth]

This new movie which supposedly (if that's a word ) portrays a side of Hitler we don't see very much in movies.

German film shows Hitler's tender side

COLOGNE, Germany (Hollywood Reporter) -- A German movie that depicts Adolf Hitler as a soft-spoken man who charms his secretary and lovingly plays with his pet Alsatian is turning into one of the country's most controversial films.

In addition to depicting Hitler not just as a screaming demagogue, "Downfall" breaks one of the last taboos of German cinema by portraying Hitler in a central role.

"It is not the first time (we've seen) Adolf Hitler on the screen, but it is certainly the first time they have tried to discover the human touch in the monster," said Rolf Giesen, head of Berlin's Film Museum.

That approach has sparked fierce debate in the German press, with some critics warning the film could pander to neo-Nazis.

"'Downfall' prompts the question whether one should be allowed to feel sympathy for Hitler," German newspaper the Frankfurter Allgemeine wrote in a recent article criticizing the film.

So any of our German friends who have seen the movie? Does anybody here as any objections to showing Hitler in a different light?

 

[babyman]

i would never have made a film about hitler, as much as i know the film is about he's last days before suicide, what do we want to learn about

 

[ThatGuy]

I think it's important for people to realize that otherwise ordinary people can do terribly awful things. That being said, I have no desire to see this film.

 

[nbcrusader]

Does anybody here as any objections to showing Hitler in a different light?

I think it is healthy to pose the questions/ideas and expose them to scrutiny instead of keeping it under wraps.

 

[A_Wanderer]

I am sure that Hitler had a kind human side just like Stalin and Pol Pot, that is what makes them so damn scary.

 

[AvsGirl41]

I would have to agree.

I don't see how portraying the truth is neccessarily showing sympathy. So he's nice to his secretary. I don't think that in any way excuses what he did.

 

[Angela Harlem]

When I went through the bullshit with the NSW Dept of Corrective Services, the shrink guy from Long Bay asked me "Do you believe there is good in everyone?" I hesitated before saying "yes I think there is in all" The rest of the point I was going to make is probably boring and irrelevant, but I think if someone can love, there is good in them. Did Hitler use his vast intelligence for good? No. But does it mean there was no good in him?

 

[Klaus]

I think it's important to try to show the real picture even of people like hitler. If we don't do it the neofacists combine some facts with their ferrytales and it's easier for them to sell their conspiracy theories to rectruit new people

 

[babyman]

I think it's important to try to show the real picture even of people like hitler. If we don't do it the neofacists combine some facts with their ferrytales and it's easier for them to sell their conspiracy theories to rectruit new people

so otherwise someone would become fascist? so we need a movie about hitler to avoid it? history speaks alone, you don't need a movie to show or imagine invisible human sides of someone who was against humanity, btw, fascismus doesn't exist anymore

 

[Klaus]

No...
but it's just not helpful to "modify" history in these movies "based on a true story". It's good to know that even the worst people of the planet even a monster has some human sides.
This also helps us to understand how it could hapen that a monster was elected in a democracy.

And if we lie in these movies "based on a true story" we just feed the people who claim that Hitler wasn't that bad and our system just "created" the monster.

 

[beli]

This also helps us to understand how it could hapen that a monster was elected in a democracy.

Excellent point. And how to avoid it happening again.

Another "positive" characteristic of this arsehole - I have always been fascinated by Hitlers rockstaresque charismatic orations. The dude sure knew how to work the crowd.

 

[babyman]

No...
but it's just not helpful to "modify" history in these movies "based on a true story". It's good to know that even the worst people of the planet even a monster has some human sides.
This also helps us to understand how it could hapen that a monster was elected in a democracy.

And if we lie in these movies "based on a true story" we just feed the people who claim that Hitler wasn't that bad and our system just "created" the monster.

hitler was a smartass, klaus, he profited of the troubles germany was involved after the first world war, when the germans were condemned to pay for indemnities and for all the war damages.most of all germany was burdened of a moral fault, they were accused to have let the war happening, the economy drowned literally and people were drowning, too. then came the democratic republic of weimar, which was a failure since the beginning, it was a puppet government, and in 1933 hitler had no problem to play on german's feelings: "we are germans, we are the best and most intelligent population of the world, they injured our pride, how could they denigrate us, now we must make them pay!", stuff like this, he entered in the injuried hearts of the germans, no one was talking like him at that time, german people were worn out by poverty, there's non wonder people voted him. hitler was claiming about his nazi projects since the first day he came on flap. english, american, french, russian weren't thinking hitler could represent a true menace, they were all thinking, "oh, he will stay calm", everyone in the world undervalued hitler's potentialities.....and we know what happened then. nowadays i don't think something like this may happen again, we know what nazism can bring, even though there are still stupid groups of fanatics. about the human sides of hitler. i think you know that in a movie you can make things appear beautiful or bad.......so, when someone comes, and makes a movie about a "man" who killed 6.000.000 of jewish, plus other millions, and wants to encourage me or to convince me that an animal like this had human feelings then i really spit on his face, this is amazing

 

[beli]

Babyman, noone is disputing Hitler orchestrated genocide, or that what he was responsible for wasn't intolerably bad.

We can still discuss his personality. Its not taking away from the suffering his victims endured.

peace

 

[babyman]

Babyman, noone is disputing Hitler orchestrated genocide, or that what he was responsible for wasn't intolerably bad.

i wasn't thinking that

 

[beli]

sorry, my mistake

 

[Klaus]

nowadays i don't think something like this may happen again, we know what nazism can bring, even though there are still stupid groups of fanatics.

Well i think it can hapen again anytime in every country of the world.
It's easy for a charismatic person to tell the people that everything works wrong in their life is the guilt of a group which they hate anyway.
Of course it's not the same group everywhere in the world. In palestine it could still work with the jews, in america you'd have to take another group, 15 years ago it could have worked well with "the communists", today it might work with "Islam".
I was really scared how the conservative government bashed France before the Iraq-war and there was no outcry in the public, noone said "Shame on you - my government"

 

[A_Wanderer]

I believe that the comparison between the Holocaust and that of the danger from political Islam is not apt. There is a serious danger from the Islamic world, it is a political ideology not muslims. The western world has been extremely tollerant of Muslims and have not reacted violently to all Muslims, the idea of there being a massive Islamophobia on par with the Nazi's treatment of the Jews seems to be an attempt to play the victim mentality to the full in order to make many an illogical argument based on emotion (This is directed towards organizations such as CAIR which have strong ties to terrorist organizations and from whom advocacy and support for enemy entities exists, this is documented events and not mindless heresay). How many times have people seen protest groups twist the Israeli / Arab conflict into a battle between glorious Arab nationalists and an evil Judenreich. It is truly sad because it is moral relativism that gets it there.

The French government engages in very dirty deals which are ignored by many. I think that there has to be a share of condemnation for any party which cuddles up to murderers. Somebody says "NO BLOOD FOR OIL" I will say "How about those French oil contracts with the Sudanese regime".

 

[babyman]

sorry, my mistake

no probs

 

[babyman]

Well i think it can hapen again anytime in every country of the world.
It's easy for a charismatic person to tell the people that everything works wrong in their life is the guilt of a group which they hate anyway.


yeah, not to exclude. but since the second world war we western people have grown up in the so called welfare state, that's why i think there's surely less possibility to organize an authoritarian regime of the same seriousness like nazism or fascism. of course there are still authoritarian states in some parts of the world, but it's becoming tough for dictators, we're having a full democratization of nations which lived under dictatorship, (look at many south american nations for instance), now the asian states are having a convergence to democracy...............unfortunately the methods mattered(like it still does), but we know it's another question......

 

[Klaus]

babyman

right - and while the "so called welfare state" goes down chances for the extremists are on the rise

 

[AvsGirl41]

Germany was a republic when Hitler rose to power.

Their economy was crap, but they were democratic.

I could see another Hitler rise to power, easily. Even in an affluent, democratic country. There's always someone to hate, and someone to benefit from it.

Look at Stalin. The Soviet Union was doing pretty well when he took power. But people still bought into his purges.

 

[A_Wanderer]

The Soviet union was not a democratic affluent state when Stalin murdered his way to power. In order to have any major shift to the left or right one needs a disenfranchised population, one who are so sick of their current system they will follow a strong-man leader even if it means surrendering their rights. It could happen in the US or any other country if the conditions changed enough, I do not see it happening any time soon because peoples living standards are still too high and it is still a pluralist liberal democracy.

 

[hiphop]

so otherwise someone would become fascist? so we need a movie about hitler to avoid it? history speaks alone, you don't need a movie to show or imagine invisible human sides of someone who was against humanity, btw, fascismus doesn't exist anymore

fascism still exists pretty much and is on the rise. youre from milan, you should know about persons like the mussolini daughter. im not even gonna start about bossi or berlusconi.

 

[Klaus]

AvsGirl41:

 

[babyman]

fascism still exists pretty much and is on the rise. youre from milan, you should know about persons like the mussolini daughter. im not even gonna start about bossi or berlusconi.

these are only fanatic rich people, they count nothing, in italy very few appreciate them. mussolini's granddaughter created a party which is on the 0,1% of the votes, and it's her one. bossi was almost dying of an heart attack, he's ill, in his body and in his head, but he won't have power to change nothing, he's just a racist, he can't stand people of the south.........berlusconi is falling down, next election he's out, of course there are still fascism sympathizing, but no of the same seriuosness like the real hard times, they're isolated and are an absolute minor thing

 

[AvsGirl41]

The Soviet union was not a democratic affluent state when Stalin murdered his way to power. In order to have any major shift to the left or right one needs a disenfranchised population, one who are so sick of their current system they will follow a strong-man leader even if it means surrendering their rights. It could happen in the US or any other country if the conditions changed enough, I do not see it happening any time soon because peoples living standards are still too high and it is still a pluralist liberal democracy.

Ah, when will I learn to put *all* the words in my post...
I didn't say the Soviet Union was democratic, but I can see where I might have led to that assumption. However, please pick up a Russian history textbook or one of the memoirs from the purges, such as "Into the Whirlwind" by Evgenia Ginzburg and you'll see what I'm getting at.

The 1920's-early to mid 1930's was actually a very successful period in the Soviet era, probably the only successful period. Lenin had introduced NEP, and voluntary collectivization. The economy boomed. For the *only* time in it's history, they actually had enough goods to export.

Art, music, literature were all very open. Lenin, Trotsky and Lunacharskii all recognized that artists were the pulse of a society, and art could not legitimately be in service to the state.
These were the years of great Russian cinema, when Sergei Eisenstein made some of his best films. Why do I bring this up--people had *money* to spend on art, books, and film tickets and the government was open to more discussion and dissention. It isn't the dictatorship we immediately think of. Was everything perfect? Of course not. But it's not the desperation and anger one finds in Weimer Germany, or anywhere a dictatorship would normally arise.

And then came Stalin. There was no economic shift. He simply announces one day that there's enemies within the Party, and he's going to institute purges. And people said "That sounds perfectly logical to me. Why, just yesterday, I heard my friend saying Lev Trotsky was a smart guy...." There was no social, economc or political reason to go along with it, but they did. It was collective madness. Yes, he did away with NEP and instituted the Five Year Plans, but the economy's collapse and the beginning of the purges don't exactly coincide.

Anyway, this is a huge digression.

 

[hiphop]

these are only fanatic rich people, they count nothing, in italy very few appreciate them. mussolini's granddaughter created a party which is on the 0,1% of the votes, and it's her one. bossi was almost dying of an heart attack, he's ill, in his body and in his head, but he won't have power to change nothing, he's just a racist, he can't stand people of the south.........berlusconi is falling down, next election he's out, of course there are still fascism sympathizing, but no of the same seriuosness like the real hard times, they're isolated and are an absolute minor thing

berlusconi got elected by a majority.

anyway, I hope you are right.

 

[Angela Harlem]

Seconding Avsgirl's

 

[ALEXRUS]

Ah, when will I learn to put *all* the words in my post...
I didn't say the Soviet Union was democratic, but I can see where I might have led to that assumption. However, please pick up a Russian history textbook or one of the memoirs from the purges, such as "Into the Whirlwind" by Evgenia Ginzburg and you'll see what I'm getting at.

The 1920's-early to mid 1930's was actually a very successful period in the Soviet era, probably the only successful period. Lenin had introduced NEP, and voluntary collectivization. The economy boomed. For the *only* time in it's history, they actually had enough goods to export.

Art, music, literature were all very open. Lenin, Trotsky and Lunacharskii all recognized that artists were the pulse of a society, and art could not legitimately be in service to the state.
These were the years of great Russian cinema, when Sergei Eisenstein made some of his best films. Why do I bring this up--people had *money* to spend on art, books, and film tickets and the government was open to more discussion and dissention. It isn't the dictatorship we immediately think of. Was everything perfect? Of course not. But it's not the desperation and anger one finds in Weimer Germany, or anywhere a dictatorship would normally arise.

And then came Stalin. There was no economic shift. He simply announces one day that there's enemies within the Party, and he's going to institute purges. And people said "That sounds perfectly logical to me. Why, just yesterday, I heard my friend saying Lev Trotsky was a smart guy...." There was no social, economc or political reason to go along with it, but they did. It was collective madness. Yes, he did away with NEP and instituted the Five Year Plans, but the economy's collapse and the beginning of the purges don't exactly coincide.

Anyway, this is a huge digression.

One of the best (still not perfect ) concise descriptions of what happened in the USSR at the time I've ever heard from a foreigner.

 

[Kieran McConville]

Hitler did have a human side of course, but among all of the famous despots he seems unique in the degree to which his 'personal' life ceased to exist once he became a person of power.

I take the view that very evil people should never be compartmentalised by safely relegating them to 'monster' status. They are all human, unfortunately. And it could happen anywhere. German was an advanced industrial country with a middle class, that simply suffered the effects of losing a war of agression brought on by imperial overreach. In my view Britain was lucky to relinquish its empire without similar chaos.