Hitler's Children (1943) User Reviews

Try and find a film made in 1943 that isn't about WWII!

[AlsExGal · 6/10 · 28 June 2020]

I have always wanted to watch this movie if only for the title alone. Bonita Granville plays Anna, a young lass at the American school in Berlin. It is 1933, not a good year to be a German born Yank residing in the Deutschland (not a good year for anyone to be there). The film opens with our freedom loving friends fighting a bunch of Nazi Youth. During the fracas Tim Holt, a strapping example of Germany's future meets the spunky Bonita. He quickly succumbs to her cheeky charms and after a bit of resistance Bonita returns his affection.

Time passes and Holt rises in the Nazi machine while Bonita remains in Germany (why didn't she leave? Because then we would have no movie) Eventually Bonita ends up in a labor camp unwilling to renounce her loyalty to the USA and suffers fierce reprisals for her stubbornness. Holt ultimately allows his love for her to overcome his Nazi leanings. How does this turn out? Watch and find out.

This film made a lot of money for RKO in 1943 but today it seems like an obvious piece of wartime propaganda, melodramatic and shrill but for a few interesting moments. A close-up of Holt and Granville embracing in shadow was beautiful and a fine example of German Expressionism. There were scenes of Anna fleeing her enemies in the woods. These were lovely and evoked again those fabulous Universal horror films of the thirties. Nice film noir touches. Granville's flogging by the Nazi's was appropriately brutal. Otto Kruger and Hans Conried are always a welcome addition to any movie. H.B. Warner plays a very talkative Catholic priest.

Directed by Jules Dassin, it is interesting to see for that reason alone.

Love among the Nazis

[LCShackley · 6/10 · 5 September 2009]

This film must have been rather shocking at the time, as it revealed many Nazi practices which would have offended American morality:

• They forced single women to have babies "for the Fuehrer"

• They sterilized women who were undesirables, either because of their race or their ideas

• They raided churches and preached the destruction of Christianity

• They brainwashed young people and encouraged them to violence against their enemies

Of course, mixed in among the propaganda is a love story between a Hitler Youth member and an attractive German/American girl attending an American school in Germany (which is conveniently situated across from the humorously-named "Horst Wessel School"). Besides having solid lead players, this film also boasts a strong supporting cast including H. B. Warner, Hans Conried, and Erford Gage (who would soon be killed in action during WW2).

The quality of this film is higher than other similar propaganda movies of the time, and has some touching (although predictable) scenes of love and sacrifice. And the opening scene of a Hitler Youth rally may serve as a warning against what happens when a politician with a cult of personality tries to control the minds of young people.

Entertaining Propaganda

[noahax · 7/10 · 14 May 1999]

I stumbled across this film on cable and was immediately hooked. Created as a propaganda film to show the horrors of living in Nazi Germany, it seems quite naive in retrospect, as the full atrocities of the Holocaust were not yet public knowledge. Subtle, it is not, but it is definitely interesting as a historical novelty.

Good historical accuracy re Hitler youth & 'lebensborn' rules

[knutsenfam · 25 January 2004]

I used to think this film quite dated, but still moving.

Now that I know more about Hitler Youth and about "lebensborn", forced sterilization, training in cruelty, and other Hitler Youth goals, this film stands up extremely well.

***What was 'lebensborn'? Basically, those considered "racially pure" were encouraged to have tons of kids...in or out of wedlock. About 10,000 born in Germany & 10,000 born in Norway from German soldier fathers, per one Internet source. Do your own internet search to learn more about "lebensborn".

In the movie, Bonita Granville's character refuses to deliberately sire a child out of wedlock even with her love, Tim Holt.

***Forced sterilization. Bonita's character is threatened with forced sterilization since she is not cooperative. Again, this was a historical Nazi tactic. She would rather undergo the procedure than bring a child into such a regime.

***Hitler Youth cruelty...One sees some of the Hitler youth trained to

be cruel. One need only listen to the old former Hitler Youth speak (some with tears & great sorrow) about various ways they were so abused (i.e. trained to be cruel) by the Nazi regime.

***Harrassment of Christians...The resistance of some Christian leaders to the Nazis. Near the end of the movie, the priest rebukes the Nazis who apparently dare not carry him off for punishment. This happened sometimes...A Christian leader might rebuke the Nazis such as Bishop Von Galen who stood against the destruction of retarded, etc. Some Christian leaders went to jail like Pastor Niemoller. Some Christian leaders were martyred for their stance against Nazis (including anti Jewish policies) like Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Here again, the movie is quite timely.

From these main examples, I conclude that this movie is **not** merely propaganda but reflects many historical accuracies (at least what was known at the time). Does it cover all the Nazi atrocities? No. (One movie alone wouldn't be long enough to do so.)

***************************

Hitler's Children could be shown on a "Movie in Time" sequence on History Channel. The corrections, amendations to it based on actual history, I predict, would be slight. It's from a book on Nazi education of youth written by educator and correspondent Gregor Ziemer who also taught in the American School in Berlin. (Hit Ziemer's name in the credits for details!)

Don't let the black & white film & slightly older dialogue deter you from using this film to teach yourself (or your kids, or your class) as to how German youth were abused thru Hitler Youth and lebensborn programs.

Do your own research. Verify for yourself. While Hitler's concentration camp murders were the most cruel of his abuses, his other abuses of even the so called "nordic" peoples, especially women and girls, should also be REMEMBERED! (PS real life Hans and Sophie Scholl, college age German resisters to the Nazis, would also be a great research topic!)

Education For Death

[utgard14 · 7/10 · 16 November 2014]

Gripping WW2 movie about a young Gestapo officer (Tim Holt) who must choose between his loyalty to Hitler and the American girl he loves (Bonita Granville). Well-photographed and directed, it's a powerful and fascinating movie that has a lot to chew on for history buffs but is also an entertaining dramatic picture. It was pretty shocking stuff at the time, which led to it being a big hit at the box office. Tim Holt is fantastic in this. Definitely in his top three roles. He was a good actor who's largely forgotten today except among classic film fans. Bonita Granville has one of her meatiest parts here. This is a far cry from Nancy Drew. Kent Smith has a nice role as a sympathetic teacher. He narrates the first part of the movie. Otto Kruger and Hans Conried are two of the Nazis. As with a lot of WW2 era films on IMDb, you'll notice the reviews here are full of the word 'propaganda.' Try to ignore that. The problem isn't with the word itself but some use it to cast aspersions or impugn the honesty of a film. People these days have so many axes to grind and so much anger towards the wrong things. It's unsettling to me but, frankly, I'd rather not unravel that thread.

A girl, a boy, and the Fuehrer

[bkoganbing · 7/10 · 10 August 2016]

The very much critically acclaimed Hitler's Children is still quite a powerful film today. Potential lovers Tim Holt and Bonita Granville can never quite get together because of the Nazi ideology that Tim espouses.

The film has certain similarities to MGM's The Mortal Storm though without the A list cast of that one. The two go to different schools across the street from each other. Bonita is German born, but a naturalize American living with her grandparents while she attends the American school run by Kent Smith. Tim goes to the German all boys school for the new Hitler Youth and it was new when this film's action starts in 1933.

It's no accident that this was a boys school for the German youth. The Nazi ideology was firmly patriarchal and eloquently expressed the fact that women were child bearing vessels and nurturers of future Nazis and nothing more. No accident when you see Nazi rally newsreels for the young and old it's an all male cast. Hitler's Children explores that issue far more than most wartime films made by the Allies.

Kent Smith has the Nick Carroway narrative part in the story, we see it through his eyes up to the moment he departs for Paris and knowing full well the Nazis will be there shortly.

Holt and Granville are an attractive pair. Hitler's Children has aged far better than most American war films of the World War II era.

Sensational for it's time it is an interesting period piece.

[artroraback · 6/10 · 15 October 2002]

I can see how this film would have created a stir when it was released in 1942.World War II was being fought and the Germans dominated Europe. The film is the story of two star crossed lovers: an American girl with German blood and an unfortunate young man who rises from the Hitler Youth and becomes a colonel in the Gestapo. Kind of an unusual take on the boy meets girl story but a good film just the same. Recommended for history buffs and Tim Holt fans.

difficult to believe ending, but very effective and worthwhile WWII propaganda film

[planktonrules · 7/10 · 20 July 2006]

I love watching old American and British WWII propaganda films. Sure, they were often rather one-dimensional or at times ridiculous and some people tend to think that the word "propaganda" is a bad thing, but in this case these films were positive in that they helped to unify the country and get us behind the war effort. Yes, it's true some of them had horrible stereotypes and images of the enemy (particularly how the Japanese were portrayed as almost subhuman), but this was war and, unfortunately, some of the worst images these films showed were BETTER than the real enemy! The film HITLER'S CHILDREN was a very well-made film from RKO that told a fictional story about some young people--in particular, Bonita Granville and Tim Holt, who were caught up in the hysteria and evil of the Hitler youth and other organizations targeting children. At first, the story is told from the viewpoint of the fine character actor Kent Smith. Then, later in the film it switches to Granville, as she is forced into a German indoctrination camp and wants desperately to escape. Otto Kruger enters the story as a pretty dumb Nazi officer who has high hopes for Granville and Holt in the party. However, his hopes are dashed when Granville escapes. What happens next, I'll leave to you so I won't spoil the film. However, the weakest aspect of the film involves the ending with young Holt--this just never would have or could have happened--but it's very entertaining nevertheless.

While this film is much truer in its depiction of the Germans than most contemporary films, the film actually in some ways makes the Nazis look a little dumber and less evil than they actually were. The excellent acting of H. B. Warner as the Bishop is great, except we found out after the war that any clergy speaking out against the regime would have been sent to a concentration camp or killed--the Bishop's comments to the Nazi officers or his sermon denouncing the party never would have gone unpunished.

Still an effective and captivating film.

The way we saw Germany in 1943

[MrsMurgatroyd · 8/10 · 21 April 2006]

I saw this as a young girl in 1943. It was in the middle of WW2 and the end of the war was not clear cut as it might seem now. People were getting tired of rationing certain foods and gasoline and the restrictions of war time precautions on the East Coast.

Looking back I see now that this type of propaganda was necessary in the view of the Movie crowd. Many young men were being killed and taken prisoner in France and Germany and Italy. I think people needed to be reminded that the war was necessary because of the aggression forced upon the United States people.

I suppose not too many of us are alive now to remember those days so it is easy to put the movie down as exaggerated propaganda. And it was but I see it as one of those things that one would expect during a war.

Truthfully I saw the movie as being very real at the time and I loved Bonita Granville and Tim Holt as the stars. I see it now as part of a pattern of keeping the ordinary people stirred up against our enemies. So be it. How will todays movies be interpreted in 60 years?

It's just interesting to have lived through 5 wars and be able to look at things more objectively.

Not That Far Below Par.

[rmax304823 · 6/10 · 20 September 2016]

Germany, 1933. Tim Holt is a young German student and Bonita Granville is an American student at a nearby school. While he's learning the Horst-Wessel-Lied, she's learning about democracy under the kindly tutelage of Professor Kent Smith. Holt likes the way pretty Bonita plays the piano but the state doesn't

Poor Kent Smith. Everyone says he's "bland." I find him reassuring, like a fixed location in a changing and disappointing universe. The only problem I had with him is that the Nazis are always calling him "Hair Professor." It conjured up images of his earning his PhD at Annie's Supercut and Quick Style Salon with a major in Veronica Lake.

Well, the loving couple grow up, unfortunately, and he becomes swept up in the national fervor. And why not? Hitler had a good pitch to make. Germany had been so thoroughly traduced after World War I that the nation was punished by being made to pay the cost of the war in reparations and its territories chopped up and given away. The soldiers and people thought they had signed a truce instead of an abject surrender. Hitler put everybody to work (building up the war machine) and got them out of a terrible economic depression.

Next time the lovers meet, Granville is a teacher at the American school and Holt is a stiff-necked Nazi lieutenant in riding breeches and black boots. You have to hand it to the Gestapo. They knew how to make spiffy uniforms all right.

The Nazis begin culling the herd, rounding up Jews, Poles, and other undesirables. Granville, having been born in Germany but raised in America, is under German law because, after all, "German blood runs through her veins." That was a major problem with the Nazis. They kept mixing up biology ("race") with culture (learned behavior). Granville rebels against the new order, while Holt appears to go along with it until the end, when love binds the two of them together.

It's full of stereotypes naturally but not especially stupid ones. It's a propaganda movie but it's not aimed at little kids like a cartoon. The characters are often engaging. Otto Kruger is the Gestapo major and he's splendidly evil in a suave way. He's right up there in the first rank of suave villains along with James Mason and George Sanders.

It's an earnest movie. Not a lot of jokes. But I kind of enjoyed watching it except for an occasional wince. I don't know how it would fare with today's audiences. Hair Professor tells an old Chinese folk tale. He refers to the English essayist Charles Lamb. Worst of all, he recites a passage from Goethe's "Faust" -- "Hold, thou art so fair." Lamb. Goethe. Faust. I could almost hear the eurhythmic breathing.

Unabashed wartime propaganda constitutes grim historical curio

[bmacv · 3/10 · 4 September 2002]

Hitler's Children exists now only as a historical curio – an example of wartime propaganda at its most blatant. There are a few points of interest: Edward Dmytryk directed it, and Roy Webb wrote the score, while a number of not-too-small stars showed up to perform their patriotic duty: Tim Holt and Bonita Granville claim top billing, assisted in a large cast by Otto Kruger, H. B. Warner, Kent Smith and Hans Conried.

The movie opens with a tableau of a nighttime Nazi rally that might be a Ku Klux Klan meeting – or one of Wieland Wagner's postwar Wagner productions at Bayreuth. It tells the story of Granville, an American of German extraction who is, basically, kidnapped by the Reich. Troubled by her mistreatment, childhood sweetheart Holt, now a Nazi officer, ultimately if too late sees the error of his ways.

Propaganda, of whatever stripe, adopts totalitarian rules, or lack thereof. We're asked simultaneously to accept contradictory propositions: that an evil clique illegitimately holds the power of the state and imposes Nazism on a terrorized populace, but that the populace fervently believes in Nazi values and supports Hitler's government at great personal sacrifice. When Hitler's Children was released, The United States was already at war with Germany. The question remains, at whom was this propaganda directed, and what did it hope to accomplish?

NOTE: Owing presumably to wartime passions, Hitler's Children became one of RKO's biggest money-makers up to that time (far outdoing, for instance, Citizen Kane).

Still powerful

[preppy-3 · 9/10 · 11 September 2002]

A Nazi officer (Tim Holt) falls in love with a freedom-fighting American girl (Bonita Granville) in WWII Germany. Very dated (of course) but still worth seeing. The film pulls no punches is showing how horrible life in Germany was during the war. I especially like them showing German citizens as being against Hitler and unhappy also. It is naive (concentration camps are mentioned once and very casually) but, at the time this was made, that's all we knew about Germany. A big hit in its day--it's easy to see why.

Holt and Granville are good in the leads--especially Holt who has a powerful speech at the end. Also the film moves quickly and is never dull. A very good look at Germany during WWII. Well worth catching.

Crackling propaganda

[marcslope · 7/10 · 8 September 2009]

Most of the anti-Nazi propaganda coming out of Hollywood circa 1943 was set on the battlefront; this RKO programmer avoids the battlefield and limits the military to stock footage, but it's more powerful and engaging than many a contemporary war picture. Set at an American school in Berlin, it takes a while to establish why the two young leads (Bonita Granville and Tim Holt) speak in unaffected English while all around them sport comic-Nazi accents, and it's a little jarring at first to see the Hitler-youth children behaving like sitcom Americans ("Aw gee, can't we study outside?"). But once the propagandistic plot points kick into gear it becomes a real rouser, with the good American teacher (Kent Smith) trying to track down Granville through her appropriation, exploitation, and eventual sad end with the Nazis. It's surprisingly brutal in spots, and it's not afraid to have an extremely downbeat ending for its day. Director Edward Dmytryk and his DP appear to have actually studied Leni Riefenstahl for some of their compositions, and while the morality is very black-and-white (Nazi=evil, everybody else=good), for once that doesn't feel simplistic.

Weird propaganda thriller

[funkyfry · 5/10 · 11 October 2002]

Tim Holt is a nazi youth devoted to Alolf Hitler, but also in love with a petite American blonde (Granville, stepping up from A-support to B-lead) who lives and eventually works in the American school next to the nazi academy. If it sounds like a ridiculous story will develop, you won't be too surprised. Straight propaganda with the spice of melodrama. Kruger is great in a supporting part as Holt's mentor, an Oxford educated nazi colonel. I believe this movie was distributed by expoiteers wiht added holocaust footage on the end (if the sherrifs were out of sight) in the 50s. Interesting to see once, but probably not twice.

It Is What It Is.

[Bucs1960 · 17 October 2002]

War time propaganda films must be viewed in the context of the times in which they were made. It is sometimes difficult to appreciate a film because of the framework of propaganda. This film, made at the beginning of the war with Germany, attempts to depict what was happening in that country and the threat it posed to the world. It may be somewhat simplified but it gets the point across.

Bonita Granville, an appealing actress who began her career as a child star, does a fine job as the German/American young woman who is caught up in the maelstrom of Nazism. Tim Holt, as the German officer, seems miscast somehow.....I still see him searching for the Treasure of Sierra Madre with Humphrey Bogart but maybe that's just my problem. Kent Smith, a yeoman actor, whose face was everywhere during the 40's, is his usual bland self. The coup of casting is Otto Kruger as Tim Holt's mentor.....he was an underrated actor, who always gave good performances.....see him in "Murder My Sweet" as the sleazy Anthor to really appreciate his talents. Hans Conreid, usually thought of as a comic actor, plays against type here and it works well enough. Since hindsight is 20/20, we notice that some of the major atrocities of the Nazi regime, such as concentration camps (mentioned briefly) and the "Jewish question" are not addressed. View this film for what it is....propaganda....an attempt to show the audience that other world, where terrible things were happening and why America was fighting to preserve freedom. It's a piece of history that is worth watching.

Can we stop Hitler's Children, Before It's Too Late!

[sol-kay · 6/10 · 15 July 2006]

***There are Spoilers*** The movie "Hitler's Children" starts with a torch light ceremony with hundreds of Hitler Youth at some outdoor sports stadium in, what seems like, Nuremberg. The movie ends with the German City of Colone bombed into rubble in one of the many USAAF/RAF 1,000 plane bombing raids on the Third Reich during WWII. That's about the most penetrating realistic and effective scenes in the movie.

Somewhat unconvincing love story between an American girl Ann Miller/Muller, Bonita Grandville, who was born in Germany and a German boy and on and off fanatical Nazi Karl Bruner,Tim Holt, who was born in America who's lives become entangled during the movie. Anna later ends up in a German work camp with Karl being the one who's assigned to have her given ten lashes for being uncooperative and disloyal to the Fuhuer and his Nazi henchmen.

The movie tries very hard to make the Nazis look bad and evil but only makes them look like a bunch of ridicules and bumbling buffoons who can't even keep a girl, Anna, in line much less be able to conquer almost all of Europe and even threaten to take over the entire world. Both Anna and Karl also change horses in midstream a number of times in the movie going from one extreme as die in the wool Nazis to another by openly denouncing the Nazi party and it's leader Adolf Hitler to the point where they can be shot on the spot which is exactly what happens at the end of the film.

Being enrolled at the American School in Berlin Anna meets Karl during one of the many fight that the American students have with the Nazi Youths in the school that they attend across the street. In all these fights the Nazi supermen always seem to get the hell beaten out of them. Karl having his skull cracked in a fight with the American youths goes into their school to talk to principle and professor "Nicky" Nichols, Kent Smith, to get some dressing and medicine for his badly swollen head. It turns out that the real reason Karl went there was to get a peek at Anna whom he's secretly in love with. Karl makes a play for Anna and she really starts to get to like him but then the movie goes six years into the future, from the spring of 1933 to the spring of 1939. It's then now begin see that the world, and Germany, changed for the worse and so did Karl.

Rounding up all unfit, psychically and mentally, undesirables to go to work for the state and all German born foreigners, like Anna, to be inducted into educational camps to become full-fledged Nazis things that was taken for granted in the pre-Nazi era have now been taken away from the German People. All this was replaced with a cult-of-personality, Hitler & Co,like government that's to be worshiped and obeyed by all Germans in Germany and abroad.

It's hard to take the Nazi's seriously in the movie when we see them go to the extreme of using an entire, armed to the teeth, Gestapo unit to chase down and captured Anna for just taking off from camp without permission. And later ending up getting whipped in public for it. where at same time the Nazis not as much as say boo to the Catholic Bishop, H.B Warner, who tells off the head of the Gestapo Major Copel, played by Gavin Muir, to the point of insulting Hitler and wishing that his Third Reich would go down in flames and be stomped into the ground by it's enemies! You would think that the least that Gestapo chief Copel, being the evil and unfeeling person that he is, would do is give the Bishop a warning to not says things like that again if he knows what's good for him! But all Major Copel does is look stupid and put on a pose that seemed to be an imitation of Napoleon Bonaparte!

Karl soon fell from grace by showing that he was human and not a mind-controlled Nazi with him showing affection and refusing to whip his love Anna. He's then made to repent his crimes. Karl is made to speak on the German Government radio telling the youth of Germany what a big mistake he made by turning his back on Hitler and his Third Reich and begging for forgiveness. Karl is to do this before he's to be executed for what he did with Anna, who's also facing a Nazi firing squad, present.

It's not hard to guess what happens at this great and live event with millions of German listeners tuned in and tens of thousands outside the radio studio to see it live and in color. Karl knowing he has nothing to lose changes his tune in mid-sentence yet is still allowed to go on with his renouncing of Hitler and his Nazi policies! The Nazi bigwigs at the studio don't seem to have a clue to what he's saying until Karl almost finishes his speech and then blast him away together with the now happy, and now all is forgiven, Anna. This all happens with everyone man woman and child, and even pet,in the Third Reich listening in.

Even as war-time propaganda "Hitler's Children" came up short and didn't deliver the goods being that the story took place from 1933 to 1939. Two years before America entered the war against Germany and even before WWII broke out in September of that, 1939, year!

The worst crime that Adolf Hitler committed up to the time that "Hitler's Children" was supposed to take place was the rounding up and shooting of some 1,000 of his own brutal and criminal Nazi Brownshits. This happened on the evening of June 30-July 1, 1934 in what became known as the infamous Night of the Long Knives.

How fascism became legal.

[mark.waltz · 6/10 · 19 October 2016]

One thing that free nations should focus on in their continuing history is to keep an open eye and ear and never become complacent. When you settle for the blind eye, you either end up with Chancellor Hitler or a president who manipulates the people to destroy freedom. It happens bit by bit, as liberal thinking on certain issues becomes the norm. This film, made at the height of America's involvement in the war, is a dark reminder, unsubtle and ugly, that is as potent in a very serious election year, as it was 75 years ago.

German born American Bonita Granville ends up under the thumb of the Nazi's by standing up to them when her role as a teacher in American schools in Germany, makes her subject to Nazi judgment and cruelty. She is torn between two childhood friends; one a rising Nazi (Tim Holt), the other an American teacher (Kent Smith) who fights to save her while fighting for freedom behind the scenes.

Important in its time to be told the way it was, this provides anger and shock as the evil methods of the Nazi's are exposed: sterilizing women, expelling students from the school for sinister motivations, and sentences Granville to 10 lashes for "treason". Veteran character actors H.B. Warner and Otto Kruger, who played similar parts both good and bad, give cool and calm performances, ironically one as a Nazi leader and the other as a priest. There's one scene where Holt goes against the Nazi's briefly that doesn't ring as true, but that is the one minor gripe. This is as filled with propaganda as they come, but the messages live on as America faces its own challenges in preventing similar leaders as Hitler from getting into office.

Shock And Awe Propaganda Film

[DKosty123 · 7/10 · 12 August 2016]

In 1943, Hollywood needed to keep pushing to make sure here at home that we understood there could be no sympathy to the Nazi cause. This movie is not just effective, but shockingly effective. It does avoid mostly the Jewish / Nazi Holocaust, which even though by 1943 we knew it was going on, this book it is based upon did not make this as a central theme. This one concentrates more on National Socilism brainwashing themselves as the ultimate solution to fix world problems. On this point, it is shockingly effective.

Bonita Granville and Hans Conreid, both who were in the excellent 1942 film "Now Voyager" are here with a shockingly different role for cowboy fixture Tim Holt. The weakest point of the film is the love story between Granville and Holt which is typical for this period, but had to be here to round out the movie.

The strongest point is having the American University in Nazi Germany and how as Hitler took more control, how they tried to really indoctrinate children into their view of world domination. It is shocking even now to think of what they are trying to accomplish. There is even a Hospital Operation Sequence which points out how the Nazis were using Medicine to try and accomplish their goals.

This predates the Boys from Brazil, and for shock value is a valuable film to see. Granville and Holt get a lot of support in a well directed RKO effort that sold a lot of tickets when it was released.

excellent and sad war-time love story

[dlwymond · 10/10 · 15 November 2006]

I found this film to be one of the most captivating and well-kept movie secrets of all time. If it is the first time you see it, you might be surprised that it was boldly made before WWII was over. The film stretches some emotions like taffy, while it is not overly-graphic, and only moderately intense. It instills in you with what seems to be a fair overview of the Nazi regime, while entertaining you with a plot of escape & a love story. To be expected, the conversation in it is surreal, typical of the film's era, but the only drawback for me is that Bonita Granville (age 19 when the film was made), who plays Anna Miller, passed in 1988 and actually stopped making major films after 1950. I did not realize what a beautiful girl she was until I discovered her in this picture a few weeks ago. A film for all generations (I was born 20 years after WWII).

Typical love story

[dgz78 · 2/10 · 15 July 2006]

Okay, I saw this title coming up on TCM and I had to watch it. What the heck could a movie called Hitler's Children be like? Well, it's your typical WWII love story. Nazi meets girl; Nazi loses girl; Nazi gets girl and they both die.

I understand this was propaganda for the American audiences during the war but really. To call the acting wooden is an insult to all trees and Alec Baldwin. Even Otto Kruger and Tim Holt seem to sink under the weight of the story.

Edward Dmytryk directed one of my favorite movies, The Caine Mutiny, as well as a great Chandler story, Murder My Sweet. But you had to be a member of the Hollywood Ten to think this movie should ever be released. Oh wait, Dmytryk was a member of the Hollywood Ten.

I give this movie a two because it tells a little bit of the horrors of the Nazis though obviously they didn't know everything that the Nazis were doing. But surely by 1943 people knew the Germans were doing worse things then sterilizing women.

There's just no suspense in this movie. And it's just not that you know how the movie will end after watching the first five minutes. Maybe the bad acting kept reminding me its only a movie but I think a typical Hogan's Heroes episode had more tension.

Didn't Hollywood have enough talent to make a better movie than this? At least Leni Riefenstahl made Triumph of the Will. Now that was a propaganda. Maybe she was a Nazi and maybe she wasn't. But where was Hollywood's Leni Riefenstahl?

This Movie Is Not "Propaganda"

[spiritof67 · 8/10 · 8 December 2017]

People here, most of whom never actually confronted Nazism, its secondary movements or effects nor grew up with WW2 being a recent occurrence, seem very quick in their ignorance to label this film "propaganda". It is not. "Propaganda" is when you string together not- usually-true items and popular talk to make people think something which may not be true IS actually true.

There is no single actual fact in any major theme in this film that is untrue, that did not in fact happen more than once and that was designed to make Americans think anything that was not true. In fact, Mr. Dmytrk went easy on the Nazis, if anything. I am sure the studios and the War Department wouldn't have allowed that...yet they should have.

SPOILER ALERT HERE

There is dramatization here, of course, especially the ending. But there were no films made about Auschwitz or Bergen-Belsen during wartime, sadly, either. If anyone can show proof that there is untruth in any major part of this film, let her or him please state those untruths.

This film opens a book on the Hitler Youth that never should have been closed and should be told and told again by free people to defend against what that movement created. And please note and remember: the German-American Bund was still active in America when this film was made...

"Long live the enemies of Nazi Germany"

[ackstasis · 5/10 · 26 November 2008]

Browsing Hollywood's cinematic output from the early 1940s, you'll come across WWII propaganda of varying degrees. First, there's the patriotic war-time films whose anti-German messages are really only incidental to the chosen subject matter, such as Curtiz's 'Casablanca (1942)' and Wilder's 'Five Graves to Cairo (1943).' Screenwriters, in an effort to show their continued support towards the Allied cause, strove tirelessly to out-do each other with progressively more triumphant and uplifting concluding speeches, and it's often difficult not to feel inspired by their impressive words. On the more extreme end of the scale, just short of the out-and-out propaganda documentaries like Capra's "Why We Fight (1943)" series, are those films that exist solely to extol the virtues of America, and, more importantly, to condemn the evils of Germany. I'm all for patriotism, but watching 'Hitler's Children (1943)' feels like walking into a brain-washing institution to have my individual values and beliefs replaced with those of my government; the cinema had become Hollywood's own re-education clinic.

Alas, the film was directed by Edward Dmytryk, and so, like all his films, it's well-made. Despite a somewhat pathetic attempt to blend Tim Holt into a classroom of young adolescents, there's no doubting that the workman-like Dmytryk could put together a scene, and Russell Metty's cinematography is impressive, even including a fogged-out 'Casablanca'-inspired airport runway. But why am I watching this film? Indeed, why did anybody go to watch this film? From a $205,500 budget, 'Hitler's Children' made a staggering $3.355 million in ticket sales, suggesting that audiences were more than willing to sacrifice their money for 80 minutes of unadulterated anti-German sentiment, however overdramatised and clichéd it may be. The problem with watching propaganda, at least for me, is that you treat every new revelation with skepticism, eyes narrowed to scrutinise the latest evil quality attributed to the Nazis. The film may (or may not) be accurate in its depiction of Lebensborn, forced sterilisation and youth corruption, but I'm not buying any of it, certainly not from a film that's so set on convincing me.

Who are the Germans? Well, to this film's credit, Germany's entire population is never collectively deemed evil. Rather, the nation's immorality is attributed to the few maniacs coordinating Hitler's sinister regime, with the lower citizens cooperating either through fear or through more active coercion. These generals, smugly-satisfied lackeys to the Fuhrer, are more comically droll than fearsome, cutting short an anti-Nazi tirade by shooting down their two unarmed prisoners rather than simply disconnecting the microphone; they really walked into that one, didn't they? That perfectly innocent children are being tainted from birth is genuinely a frightening (and later a notably Orwellian) idea, but not one that the film explores as effectively as it should have, instead content with concocting a forced romance between a fiercely patriotic German (Holt) and his German-born American sweetheart (Bonita Granville). Kent Smith gives the film's most natural and likable performance as Professor Nichols, an American schoolteacher who is justifiably aghast at Hitler's practices. Oh, it's all adequate entertainment, I suppose, but 'To Be or Not to Be (1942)' was so much more fun.

Interesting glimpse of Hollywood's wartime propaganda...POSSIBLE SPOILERS...

[Doylenf · 16 October 2002]

While a not too subtle approach to the problem of Hitler's menace in wartime Germany, this is an interesting glimpse of what was happening to young Germans before and during World War II.

It was very popular at the time although it now seems dated and the propaganda is a bit heavy handed. A nice B-movie cast is headed by Bonita Granville, Kent Smith and Tim Holt and the tense direction is by Edward Dmytrik. Bonita shows that her child star status was no fluke, evolving into an adult role with smooth proficiency. Equally up to the task is Tim Holt as a German Nazi who has known her since their early school days and is still smitten with the strong-willed lass. As a kindly sort of father figure to the two is Kent Smith, a teacher at the American school who tries to save both of them from the ultimate tragedy that claims them.

Roy Webb's background music makes the proceedings even more tense. One of the final scenes (where Granville is about to be whipped until Holt intervenes) seems a Hollywood touch that is more than a bit contrived--but evidently audiences in the '40s had no reservations about the overall urgency and dramatic effectiveness of the film. Well worth watching.

"This will teach me to never get caught."

[LeonLouisRicci · 9/10 · 5 September 2014]

Oddly the Most Reeking Propaganda in this Movie Pertains to the Catholic Religion as a Combatant Against Hitler and the Nazis. In Fact, the Pope and the Church in Rome Never Spoke Out Against the Nazis and in Some Respects Supported Their Anti-Jewish Sentiment, or at the Very Least Looked the Other Way and did Virtually Nothing to Condemn or Stop Them.

But that Third-Act Flaw Aside, this is a Dramatic and at Times Powerful Look at Germany and its Evil Practices. There are Many Scenes of Highlight. The Torch Lit Rallies, the Operating Room Surgeries (must have been unsettling for audiences at the time), the Bound and Gagged Little Boy Tortured to Learn a Lesson, the Flogging of a Young Woman, and a Few Others.

So Overall this is Hollywood Anti-Nazi Propaganda at its Best. A Huge Money Maker for RKO and a Movie that is Disturbing Even Today. It is a B-Movie but the Low-Budget, Second Tier Actors, and Limited Production Values do Nothing to Make this Anything Less than a Stinging Indictment of the Nazis and is Actually, for a Change, Highly Historically Accurate, Except for the Aforementioned Religiosity.

Inside every Nazi there's an American...

[xaggurat · 3/10 · 20 June 2006]

This movie's message or slogan could be "Inside every Nazi there's an American trying to get out".

Another what you see is what you get experience. Propaganda film made for the Allied war effort. If you read one sentence about the movie from a DVD back cover you will know what will happen and why. No surprises here.

The list why this kind of thing never actually happened in real history is long. The Nazis weren't this gullible nor interested in special cases. They were petty when they looked for criminalizing details about people but grand when it came to slaying them.