A good film should make us think, touch our hearts, communicate with us, and teach us something new. A good film review should persuade us, entertain us, and inform us. During the time of Nazi Germany, film, propaganda film specifically, was a very popular means of spreading ideas and manipulating millions. The Nazi Party was able to persuade people into truly believing that the Jewish population was as corrupt and as ruthless as the Nazi’s claim. Many famous films arose during this time in history. Some notable titles are Charlie Chaplain’s “The Great Dictator,” which was a comedy in opposition to the Nazis, Riefenstahl’s “Triumph of the Will,” which was saturated with pro-Nazi footage of the 1934 Nazi Party rally in Nuremberg, Harlan’s “Jud Süß,” which was set back in history and was used to validate the Nazi Party’s horrendous actions against the Jewish population, and Wilder’s romantic comedy “A Foreign Affair,” which takes you through a story of a German woman and an American soldier and their crazy love story. All of these films, whether produced during the war period or after, effectively communicate ideas and …show more content…
Even though, Salomon was breaking the law before going into the concentration camp, his motivation was not to hurt anyone, he simply wanted to make a living and a have a powerful persona. The Nazis took his seemingly small-scale skill and made it much larger and turned it into something increasingly negative. The Nazis were wrong in using Salomon’s skill and the skills of other Jewish prisoners to bring demise to other nations, which had the possibility to ruin the lives of millions of people. The Nazis were also wrong in the way they treated the Jewish people and in their anti-Semitic values. In the end, the Nazis were never able to complete their plans to flood the British and American economies and never won the war. The Jewish prisoners were finally free and good, in fact, did
Films are necessary in our time period because the human eye can articulate the message intended through sight allowing visual imagination to occur. In the book, world 2 by Max Brooks, he creates a character by the name Roy Elliot who was a former movie director. Roy Elliot manages to make a movie titled “Victory at Avalon: The Battle of the Five Colleges” and some how it goes viral. Similarly, Frank Capra’s film, “Why we Fight” expresses a sense of understanding the meaning of wars. Films do not inevitably portray truth because they display what the film director views as important and beneficial for people to know.
German cinema was greatly affected during the Nazi movement between 1933 and 1945. Once appointed Chancellor of Germany on January 30, 1933 Hitler wasted no time and almost immediately began working on his propaganda strategy. Typically “propaganda targets a mass audience and relies on mass media to persuade. Propaganda is aimed at large numbers of people and, as such, relies on mass communication to reach its audience” (Gass, 14). The Nazi party used film propaganda to brainwash the German people, distract them from the harsh reality of the Nazi party, and attempt to intimidate the enemy. Hitler knew propaganda entailed mass persuasion and he knew just how to get his message out there; film. It was through the use of propaganda, largely film that made the Nazi party so powerful as they redefined propaganda.
According to Welch, “The public’s reaction to anti-Semitic films reveals that propaganda had considerable success in persuading the population that a Jewish ‘problem’ existed, but equally that there was a limit to their tolerance of the type of virulently anti-Semitic propaganda to be found in films like Der Ewige Jude and publications like Der Stuermer.” Even after years of Nazi propaganda, even Goebbels wasn’t convinced that “such propaganda had persuaded Germans to condone open violence against
The Holocaust was the state sponsored, systematic persecution and annihilation of Jews by Nazi Germany and its collaborators between 1933 and 1945. Six million Jews were killed through the process of identification, exclusion, confiscation, ghettoization, deportation and extermination. Many who fought against the Nazi’s are seen as heroes which is clearly portrayed in the film “Schindler’s List” through the protagonist Oskar Schindler as he saves the lives of 1100 Jews. Schindler was prepared to make his fortune from World War II. Joining the Nazi party for political convenience, he staffs his factory with Jewish laborers. At the point when the SS starts eradicating Jews in the Krakow ghetto, Schindler organized to have his workers secured
The Nazi propaganda film, Triumph of the Will, is an excellent propaganda film that has many images that are meant to inspire, encourage, and invigorate the German people to be reborn. The film was made in 1934 during the rise of Adolf Hitler as the fuhrer of Nazi Germany. Hitler rose from the rank of a corporal in the German army to an inmate in a German jail. Hitler, once released, used fascist propaganda to promote the Nazi party. The propaganda promised to restore Germany as an economic leader in Europe while improving the lives of the German citizen. This pretense of a better life for German people won Hitler the dictatorship of Germany. Triumph of the Will is a good example of how propaganda entices the masses into
Classic film noir originated after World War II. This is the time where post World War II pessimism, anxiety, and suspicion was taking the world by storm. Many films that were released in the U.S. Between 1939s and 1940s were considered propaganda films that were designed for entertainment during the Depression and World War II. During the 1930s many German and Europeans immigrated to the U.S. and helped the American film industry with powerf...
Before the Second World War began Hollywood’s purpose lied within entertainment for the American people. After the war started, the main focus shifted to wartime propaganda. Film was used to display the war in a way that did not show its true colors—including the censorship of soldier causalities and other negative connotations that are a simple fact of war. There was even a time in which some actors became better known to America than politians. Through films, Hollywood began to make a statement of their anti-Nazi beliefs. They began to make motion pictures for American recruitment into the Army as well as many that supported the war effort, and intended to make other Americans more aware of the war’s effect on the United States, and how people can get involved. Many European countries banned these Hollywood films, as they began to affect not only America but many other countries that were involved in the war as well.
His exposure to the criminal acts of his oppressors changed his whole personality. All he cared about was protecting the other Jews from experiencing the same things he did.
German Cinema since Unification. Edited by David Clarke. Continuum, in association with University of Birmingham Press. 2006
Totalitarianism in the arts of Nazi-Germany portray. The most famous piece of propaganda in support of Nazi-Germany is The Triumph of the Will, directed by Leni Riefenstahl. In the context of Nazi-Germany, Triumph of the Will seems to reflect well its totalitarian upbringings: it concentrates its focus in support for Hitler through bold camera angles and symmetrical images (Fiero 423). Riefenstahl’s use of physical gaps and hierarchical distinction between leader and followers are just two of the aspects of the film that set it apart from other documentaries of the time. Triumph of the Will was monumental in that it was one of the first observational documentaries showing events like parades, mass assemblies, images of Hitler, and speeches that are occurring as if the camera was recording the natural unfolding of the events—unaffected by the presence of a camera or not. There is no spoken commentary, only speeches by Hitler and other Nazi leaders, and this is how it differs from propaganda and documentary film. These techniques are introduced and brought together by Riefenstahl in response to a need specific to her time period: that of creating support political conformity. We may be averted to the subject, we approach Riefenstahl’s documentary with an intrigue for her ability to
How can someone fully understand a tragedy such as the Holocaust? Many say the event ineffable to anyone who wasn’t there to begin with, but people are still striving to achieve complete or near complete comprehension. In order to do this people have used multiple media like books and recordings but the one that gives “the greatest illusion of authenticity” is movies. The purpose of Holocaust-filmmaking is to help people get a grasp on what it felt like to be in the middle of such a horrific thing as the Holocaust. If this isn’t done, then the true emotions won’t influence the audience who won’t find a way to preserve the history of the Holocaust and memories that took place in those awful times will be lost forever. Many films of the Holocaust
The Great Dictator by Charles Chaplin (1940) can be interpreted multiple ways. One way includes just a comedic film without any meaning. That translation would be seen by one whom knows nothing of what has gone on in the world. A second interpretation of the film by Charles Chaplin could be the belief of a parody on Adolf Hitler. In this second interpretation, one will conclude the movie to be mocking Adolf Hitler with the “similar” character of Adenoid Hynkel while addressing the issues of which were going on. Of course, there are multiple other ways of which the film could be taken. I, however, am part of the second interpretation group. I believe the film to be making a joke out of Adenoid Hynkel, depicting him as a somewhat incompetent
In the famous final speech of Charlie Chaplin’s film The Great Dictator, released in 1940, it is clear that the speaker put forward an advocacy of democracy and against tyranny. Using Kenneth Burke’s pentad as a means of analyzing this speech allows for better understanding who he places blame on and what he advocates. Moreover, Kenneth Burke’s pentad also aids in understanding the relationships between the five components of the pentad, as well as which one becomes the determinant in every part of the speech, told from the twenty ratios made up with the five components. In this final paper, I would use the model of Burke’s dramatistic pentad to tentatively explore the rhetorical motivation behind Charlie Chaplin’s speech.
A second film titled Der Sieg des Glaubens (English: Victory of Faith) (1933) is based on a Nazi conference in which it displays a vast amount of NSDAP workers listening to Hitler give a speech. It depicts a large crowd cheering and saluting to Hitler and is used to demonstrate the NSDAP’s power and to celebrate his victory. It became a prominent role in Nazi Propaganda
The expressionist movement in German art and cinema was very sensitive to the current state of the country after a huge worldwide conflict. Prior to the rise of the next Nazi Regime, German filmmakers incorporated many aspects to their films that had never been used together before this period of time. M is no exception to