More on Der Untergang

Here's a bit from Ron Rosenbaum. It's from an article about the myth of Hitler's "one testicle." I'm with Rosenbaum: there's no substantial proof that Hitler lost a testicle in WWI, and even if he had, it didn't make Hitler who he was.

However, Rosenbaum and I disagree on the movie Downfall (Der Untergang) which I reviewed a while back. Rosenbaum:

This has always been my problem with films like the German-made Downfall, which while initially being taken seriously by many, many film critics has found its true level as a YouTube camp joke. Downfall purports to offer the "inside story" of the last days of Hitler in his Berlin bunker and implicitly makes the case that the Holocaust wasn't the fault of the German people—no, they were victims, too!—but rather of one man, Hitler, and the small coterie of madmen and evil women surrounding him. Nothing to do with Germany's eager reception of exterminationist anti-Semitism.

I disagree with that. It's been a couple of years since the film came out, and I wonder if Rosenbaum's seen it recently or if he's going by old memories. That line about Downfall "initially" being taken seriously speaks volumes. This means the film got to critics, and was panned later only after they were spun by others.

There is no doubt that some German books, movies, and people-at-large play down German citizens' responsibility for the Holocaust. Fact is, the majority of Germans during the 1930s and WWII had absolutely no problem with the Nazis' answer to the "Jewish question." Some brave German writers face this reality. Some do not.

Der Untergang doesn't really go one way or the other. It does not blame regular German folk, but neither does it let them off the hook. The reason? The movie doesn't touch upon the subject at all. Hitler says a couple of lines to Speer about being proud of destroying Jewry in Europe, and that's that.

You can take that how you will. Rosenbaum takes it this way: "[Downfall] implicitly makes the case that the Holocaust wasn't the fault of the German people..."

Sorry. I don't buy it. You may think that's what the movie was doing, but there's no way you can say it was making a case for it.

Here's the thing: if a Hitler film doesn't mention that the Holocaust was the fault of the entire German nation, then it is hammered as being soft on Germans. Unfortunately, satisfying the "hard" requirement means playing games with the historical record.

In Downfall, Jews aren't a matter of much discussion. From everything I've read, this is historically accurate. The bunker was not a cesspool of people raving around the clock against Jews. It was a hole in the ground where people saw the end coming, worried about their own skins, and tried all kinds of tricks to get Hitler to grant them passes so they could make a run for it. Others that revered Hitler declared they wanted to stay with him to the bitter end, though most of those eventually scrammed. Albert Speer spent his time in the bunker trying to convince the Fuhrer not to order the self-destruction of Germany. Not to save Jews - what did he care? - but to save Germans from starvation and death once the war was over. Hitler disagreed, saying Germany deserved to burn because the German people had turned out to be weak. Then Speer hit the road.

That, to me, is evidence of a more frightening theme. Not that concentration camps weighed on people's minds in the bunker, but that they didn't consider Jews worth thinking about. No guilt, but no exaltation either. No nothing. The extermination of Jews was what is was. Big deal.

It must be remembered that up until the last day of his life, Hitler deluded himself into thinking that the war could still be won. Talk of surrender was absolutely verboten. Even after Hitler shot himself, Goebbels declined to think of surrender. Then he, too, shot himself, and still the fighting went on in the streets of Berlin.

During all of this, there simply wasn't much talk of Jews. The fact that Downfall was historically accurate should not be used against it. It's unfair to ask a film to place scenes in a movie in order to please modern day critics.

If you go back and read about the Holocaust, you will be struck by how normal Germans considered it. Boycott Jewish shops? Smash Jewish store windows? Burn synagogues? Force Jews into ghettos? Place Jews in concentration camps? Shoot Jews in the street? This went on for years, in front of, accepted, and perpetrated by the German citizenry. The orders from Nazi commanders for the dismal treatment of Jews read like dinner recipes. Dry and matter-of-fact. The "No Jews Allowed" signs at the edge of many towns was a fact of life. Again, normal.

If it's fear you're looking for, don't look into the eyes of a raving lunatic. Look at the regular joe sitting across from you in the subway and ponder what he's thinking.