I watched this film to see how truly low the human psyche could sink and concluded there seems to be no limit.
This so-called documentary is a vile ugly squalid farrago of lies and hatred yet its fascination is that it brings to the forefront again the baffling mystery of how the German people could swallow and ultimately embrace the message espoused by such tripe.
Didn't ordinary decent German citizens think there was something seriously wrong with their country when faced with images of Jews interspersed with swarms of rats or saw their streets patrolled by an ever-increasing army of men wearing black uniforms with a skull and crossbones on the cap?
The film was made in 1940 but the German people had long before then begun their tragic headlong rush into mass insanity and this relentlessly grim movie is an eloquent testament to the depravity and amorality of the Nazis, traits they with no sense of irony whatsoever ascribe to their victims.
Jews are terribly cruel to cattle and the Nazi government, we are proudly told, has banned their barbaric method of ritual slaughter, which we are shown in lengthy and disgusting detail. However, no mention is made and we are not treated to film of the barbaric ritual slaughter of human beings herded shaved and naked into vans and chambers and summarily gassed. Oh wait a minute, I forgot. Jews are subhuman, no better than rats, so that doesn't count.
The film is so preposterous that you might even think a dismissive laugh or two is in order. But laugh you won't.
This so-called documentary is a vile ugly squalid farrago of lies and hatred yet its fascination is that it brings to the forefront again the baffling mystery of how the German people could swallow and ultimately embrace the message espoused by such tripe.
Didn't ordinary decent German citizens think there was something seriously wrong with their country when faced with images of Jews interspersed with swarms of rats or saw their streets patrolled by an ever-increasing army of men wearing black uniforms with a skull and crossbones on the cap?
The film was made in 1940 but the German people had long before then begun their tragic headlong rush into mass insanity and this relentlessly grim movie is an eloquent testament to the depravity and amorality of the Nazis, traits they with no sense of irony whatsoever ascribe to their victims.
Jews are terribly cruel to cattle and the Nazi government, we are proudly told, has banned their barbaric method of ritual slaughter, which we are shown in lengthy and disgusting detail. However, no mention is made and we are not treated to film of the barbaric ritual slaughter of human beings herded shaved and naked into vans and chambers and summarily gassed. Oh wait a minute, I forgot. Jews are subhuman, no better than rats, so that doesn't count.
The film is so preposterous that you might even think a dismissive laugh or two is in order. But laugh you won't.