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A people without history, is not redeemed from time, for history is a pattern of timeless moments
T.S, Eliot(1888-1965)
The Age, July 7, 2004
Adolf Hitler is depicted in Bernd Eichinger's film The Downfall.
Directors break with tradition as the Fuehrer moves from cameo role to centre stage, writes Luke Harding.
One of the final taboos in Germany is the portrayal of Adolf Hitler in a central role on screen. He has been depicted sometimes as white space, but more usually he has little more than a cameo part, often filmed from behind.
But now, nearly 60 years after his death, two lavish German film productions set in the Third Reich a
e breaking that taboo.
Later this year and early next, German viewers will have the chance to see two Hitlers - in Bernd Eichinger's spectacular film The Downfall - Hitler and the End of the Thir
d Reich and in The Devil's Architect, a semi-documentary television s
eries by Heinrich Breloer.
Both Eichinger and Breloer are accomplished and award-winning directors and their projects feature Hitler as a fully formed main character.
The productions have prompted a debate inside Germany as to whether, with virtually all of Hitler's inner circle now dead, the Third Reich is now a fitting subject for artistic and imaginative treatment.
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"Obviously, Hitler is a very problematic person for Germans," said Dr Monika Flacke, the curator of Berlin's German Historical Museum.
"He was responsible for World War II and the Holocaust. There is something to the thesis that, if you show him on screen, you are
in danger of making him human and therefore sympathetic."
Other cultural commentators believe that with most of those directly involved in World War II now dead, the traumatic events of the
Nazi era are finally slipping into posterity.
"If an actor can now play Hitler in Germany that means the Third Reich has
become a part of history. It's no longer the painful present," said Hermann Kappelhoff, a professor of film studies at Berlin's Free University.
But he added: "I'm not totally convinced by this argument, however."
Frank Schirmacher, writing in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, added: "This much is clear: both movies break with the traditional German preoccupation with the Third Reich. (They) are the most important historical projects in many years."
The Downfall deals with the final days of the Nazi regime. It will show Hitler and Eva Braun committing suicide in his Berlin bunker on April 30, 1945, as Russian soldiers cl
ose in.
The Devil's Architect, meanwhile, will show Hitler's relationship with his personal architect, Albert Speer. Other leading Nazis appear in the series as well.
Himmler,
Goring and Goebbels all make appearances alongside other defendants at the Nuremberg trials. Even Braun is included, as are minor figures who served the Third Reich as switchboard operators,
cleaners and secretaries.
Breloer meticulously researched Speer, who spent 20 years in Spandau jail after the war, where he wrote his memoirs.
The series includes new revelations about Speer, who was also Hitler's minister for armaments, based on Breloer's discoveries in Germany's federal archives. They are apparently alarming.
Breloer met Speer in 1980, just before his death in 1981, and interviewed 23 people who knew him, including three of his children. "We see Hitler in a new light," he said.
Hitler's Reichskanzlei, his Berlin chancellery building, was recreated in a stu
dio in Cologne for the television series.
To prepare himself for his role as Hitler in Breloer's program, the actor Tobias Moretti spent hours listening to a tape secretly recorded in
1942 by a Finnish radio technician. The tape, discovered only a few years ago, features Hitler speaking in a normal voice.
Eichinger is also striving for a realistic portrayal of Hitler in The Downfall. He said recently: "We are
making a grand, epic feature film. Authenticity is the top priority."
In Eichinger's production, Bruno Ganz plays the Fuehrer. Ganz is one of Germany's most famous actors. According to reports, he hesitated before taking the role.
The film, which was shot in Berlin, Munich and St Petersburg, begins on April 20, 1945, with the Soviet army encircling the German capital.
The films come at a time when the war is being freshly debated in Germany, amid an explosion of memoirs about the trauma of the Third Reich as personal history.
"Everybod
y in Germany has a picture of Hitler in their minds. Up until now, though, this has been based on six or seven documentaries," Kappelhoff said.
"These films are an experime
nt in something different."
Skara Brae,
madkins
T.S, Eliot(1888-1965)
The Age, July 7, 2004
Adolf Hitler is depicted in Bernd Eichinger's film The Downfall.
Directors break with tradition as the Fuehrer moves from cameo role to centre stage, writes Luke Harding.
One of the final taboos in Germany is the portrayal of Adolf Hitler in a central role on screen. He has been depicted sometimes as white space, but more usually he has little more than a cameo part, often filmed from behind.
But now, nearly 60 years after his death, two lavish German film productions set in the Third Reich a
e breaking that taboo.
Later this year and early next, German viewers will have the chance to see two Hitlers - in Bernd Eichinger's spectacular film The Downfall - Hitler and the End of the Thir
d Reich and in The Devil's Architect, a semi-documentary television s
eries by Heinrich Breloer.
Both Eichinger and Breloer are accomplished and award-winning directors and their projects feature Hitler as a fully formed main character.
The productions have prompted a debate inside Germany as to whether, with virtually all of Hitler's inner circle now dead, the Third Reich is now a fitting subject for artistic and imaginative treatment.
advertisement
advertisement
"Obviously, Hitler is a very problematic person for Germans," said Dr Monika Flacke, the curator of Berlin's German Historical Museum.
"He was responsible for World War II and the Holocaust. There is something to the thesis that, if you show him on screen, you are
in danger of making him human and therefore sympathetic."
Other cultural commentators believe that with most of those directly involved in World War II now dead, the traumatic events of the
Nazi era are finally slipping into posterity.
"If an actor can now play Hitler in Germany that means the Third Reich has
become a part of history. It's no longer the painful present," said Hermann Kappelhoff, a professor of film studies at Berlin's Free University.
But he added: "I'm not totally convinced by this argument, however."
Frank Schirmacher, writing in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, added: "This much is clear: both movies break with the traditional German preoccupation with the Third Reich. (They) are the most important historical projects in many years."
The Downfall deals with the final days of the Nazi regime. It will show Hitler and Eva Braun committing suicide in his Berlin bunker on April 30, 1945, as Russian soldiers cl
ose in.
The Devil's Architect, meanwhile, will show Hitler's relationship with his personal architect, Albert Speer. Other leading Nazis appear in the series as well.
Himmler,
Goring and Goebbels all make appearances alongside other defendants at the Nuremberg trials. Even Braun is included, as are minor figures who served the Third Reich as switchboard operators,
cleaners and secretaries.
Breloer meticulously researched Speer, who spent 20 years in Spandau jail after the war, where he wrote his memoirs.
The series includes new revelations about Speer, who was also Hitler's minister for armaments, based on Breloer's discoveries in Germany's federal archives. They are apparently alarming.
Breloer met Speer in 1980, just before his death in 1981, and interviewed 23 people who knew him, including three of his children. "We see Hitler in a new light," he said.
Hitler's Reichskanzlei, his Berlin chancellery building, was recreated in a stu
dio in Cologne for the television series.
To prepare himself for his role as Hitler in Breloer's program, the actor Tobias Moretti spent hours listening to a tape secretly recorded in
1942 by a Finnish radio technician. The tape, discovered only a few years ago, features Hitler speaking in a normal voice.
Eichinger is also striving for a realistic portrayal of Hitler in The Downfall. He said recently: "We are
making a grand, epic feature film. Authenticity is the top priority."
In Eichinger's production, Bruno Ganz plays the Fuehrer. Ganz is one of Germany's most famous actors. According to reports, he hesitated before taking the role.
The film, which was shot in Berlin, Munich and St Petersburg, begins on April 20, 1945, with the Soviet army encircling the German capital.
The films come at a time when the war is being freshly debated in Germany, amid an explosion of memoirs about the trauma of the Third Reich as personal history.
"Everybod
y in Germany has a picture of Hitler in their minds. Up until now, though, this has been based on six or seven documentaries," Kappelhoff said.
"These films are an experime
nt in something different."
Skara Brae,
madkins
