Anti-Cemitism in Nazi Cinema - Essay Example

?Anti – Semitism in Nazi Cinema Anti-Semitism deals with the hatred against the Jews. The hatred against the Jews was evident in the period between 1933 and 1945. Violent riots were carried out against the Jews and brutality was at its extreme. The Nazis carried out the extreme torture against the Jews all over. The movement against the Jews was carried out in every possible manner. The Germans used every possible source to push the Jews in the backdrop. They even restored to movies for the mockery of the Jews1. In the period of 1938 the government of German ordered the Film makers of the country to produce movies of anti-Semitic content. The order from the government was carried out by the filmmakers and two anti-Semitic movies were released in the year 1939 which portrayed them as sub humans. The two most popular movies made during the era are The Eternal Jew and Jew Suss. These two films were released in the period of 1940. The basic ideas of the films were aimed to spread the felling of hatred towards the Jews in the society. In the study below, the analysis of the two movies are done with respect to the portrayal of the anti Semitism. The issues studied in the paper deals with the role play of the movie in the spread of hatred against Jews. The popularity of the movies is considered in dealing with the subject. A critical analysis of the movie is done and elements focusing the Anti Semitism are studied in detail. The characters and their portrayals are given much concern in the subject. The depiction of events and the weaving of the story are analyzed to find out the methods adopted to document the hatred against the Jews. Thesis statement: The Nazis adopted to portray Anti Semitism with the help of movies and movies like the Eternal Jew and the Jew Suss played a crucial role in dealing with the subject. The Eternal Jew: The movie was released in the 1940 as a documentary with its sole aim being the propaganda of the German Nazis against the Jews. The film was produced due to the insistence of the German government to spread hatred regarding the Jews and to spread the propaganda that they are evil part of the society. The film was directed by Hippler. The movie was titled as Der ewige Jude in German language which signified the character of Wandering Jew in Medieval folklore. The screenplay of the movie was done by Eberhard Taubert2. The film was released at a time when Poland was occupied by Nazis. The Jews were portrayed as wandering cultural parasite in the movie. The film justified the acts of the Nazis against the Jews in their typical fashion by portraying the propaganda that the Jews lead a hedonistic lifestyle. The proclaimed that Jews are like leeches and are filthy and there is no place for them in the society.3 Every possible ways was constructed to prove the unworthiness of the Jews and to virtually eradicate them from the society. Various footages were used in the documentary to support the false views of the Nazis against the Jews. It was literally evident that the German notion of transporting the Jews out of German was carried out and movie was a good idea to spread their ideas as the audience was of considerable number. If considered from this context the movie was apt and perfectly suited for the cause. The message which was tried to be inculcated among the viewers was hateful and simply awful in nature. Considering the creative angle of the movie it was poorly made and the editing was not done in a proper fashion. The Jewish people were insulted in every minute of the movie and the documentary focused on the poor and the low income group of Jews who were peasants. The movie composed of series of narration over still pictures, in some part of the movie there unexpectedly long gaps with no speech or dialogues which makes it boring. But considering the audience and the purpose aimed at this acts could be justified. The film can be claimed to be ridiculously a phobia against the Jews. Considering the time frame in which the movie released its significance cannot be overlooked. The subject of the movie reached its peak when the Jews were even compared to rats and claimed to spread disease and plaques and is harmful for the society. The narration of events in the story holds no truth as any formal documents could support it. The documentary was based purely on the myths and was an outburst of the anger of the Nazis. In the documentary Jews were claimed to lead an unhealthy and an unhygienic lifestyle. They were held as cheaters of the Christian neighbors. The migrations of the Jews were documented to have similar movements like that of the rats. At the end the documentary spread the idea that the Jews were responsible for the overall degradation of the society and was instrumental in the decline of the Western music, science, arts and commerce. The slaughter of cows as shown in the ending part of the movie was declared to be Jewish ritual and it was documented in a nasty and offensive manner.4 The Jewish practice of slaughtering was hugely criticized as it was shown that they bleed the animals into death and no measures of anesthetizing were performed by them. The documentary was crude and vicious. The film can seem to be spontaneously humorous with sadomasochist propaganda held by the Nazis. The potentiality of the hatred shown in the film cannot be ignored. It was declared by the neo Nazi groups as the best documentary film ever produced which aimed to the exclusion and the destruction of a race from a country. The final version of the movie was edited under the guidance of Hitler himself and he did approve the idea.5 The film often was used to cite reason for the holocaust. In the end of the documentary we could also see Hitler explaining the problems of Jewish presence in a society. The documentary also featured four men in beards and dressed in Jewish religious outfit and in the next scene they were shown as clean shaved persons dressed in modern suits. The idea behind this plot was to circulate the idea that Jewish had their inborn ability to transform themselves into human host and evolve out from their own shell to harm the society. Role play and portrayal Of Anti Semitism: The grudge of the Nazis against the Jews was already in picture before the movie was released. The movie added to the number of ways the Nazis carried out their rebellion against the Jews. Anti Semitism was popular in many parts of Europe. The Jews were literally harmed in their every step and in every possible manner. The Sector of filmmaking also contributed to the spread of ideas by the help of movies like The Eternal Jews. The strength of the film in the propaganda lies in its documentary objectivity. . The movie uses the power of cool objectivity in order to mark its point in the viewers mind. Anti Semitism reached its peak with horror and disgust in the last part of the film where the Jews were portrayed as barbarians and they deceived a major part of the society and infiltrated. The pretending nature of the Jews in every aspect of life was brought into limelight to show their meanness. The film claims that the true nature of the Jews was revealed by an attempt made by the Germans. The images of the film depict the result of the invasion by the Germans. The film’s idea of spreading hatred was fulfilled when Richard Wagner commented on the Jews and cited instance from the movie to prove them as the evil force. The musical accompaniment of the movie becomes distinct to stress on the fact that the Jews accompanies the foreign force. The commentary in the film which states the materialistic nature of the Jews does substantially well to highlight their greed. The social factor of greed raised significance among the Nazis and increased their hatred with the Jews as the Nazis were always against these attributes of human life. The reflection of Jews as a dangerous illusion created undue complacency among the viewers. Ideas of Jews to be a more of parasitic exploitation also raised concern for the common man and a sense of repulsion from Jews also developed within them. The less humanly nature of the Jews were confirmed by associating them with rats. All this portrayals in the film helped the Nazis a lot to raise a mass hatred for the Jews and become powerful artillery for carrying out the prejudice against the Jews. Although the film did not gained much acclamation at the box office but became historical in its content and is utterly significant in studying the Anti Semitism by the Nazis. The importance of the film rose galore not from the artistic viewpoint but due to its content of hatred against the Jews. 6 Jew Suss: The movie Jew Suss was released in the year 1940 just after the movie “The Eternal Jew”. Jew Suss was directed by Veit Harlan and the screenplay was composed by Eberhard Wolfgang Moller and Ludwig Metzger7. The movie was proclaimed to be one of the best Anti – Semitic movie ever made in history.8 The movie was based on the Nazi regime and the stereotype idea of the Nazis regarding The Jews was highlighted in the film. In this film the Nazis were held as materialistic, cunning and immoral and all inhuman attributes were depicted in their behavior. The main protagonist of the movie is a Jew who is held as a convict in charge of raping a non Jewish woman. Finally the Jew is executed and all other people from his race are evacuated from the state. The popularity of the movie can be attributed to the fact that the movie gained success and the movie featured lot of popular stars9. The movie is classified under the genre of historical costume melodrama and it was also instrumental in inciting the sentiments of the anti Jewish workers. The film is claimed to be one of the most notorious films ever made and was banned in the year 1945. The story in the film conveys the message that the Jews do not originate and belong to Germany. The movie was also critically appreciated from the technical perspective as it had cast a number of fine actors and a well written script accompanied by great music to follow. The movie was effective in carrying out the mixed task of propaganda and entertainment. The subject of the movie was well chosen in the form of historic figure, Joseph Suss Oppenheimer, who was a court Jew of a German prince. Much portion of the film is based on pure innovations though it was claimed in the movie that the movie is based on pure historical facts. A considerable number of negative characteristic is associated with the Jews in the movie but the German characters were left apart. The Jews were portrayed as immigrants, capitalist and people who poses a sexual threat on the non Jewish. The female Jewish have been claimed to pose lesser amount of threat to the other race in the region10. Special conversation between the Jewish characters in the movie reflects their hostility towards the non Jews. The movie describes the Jewish society as a horror and raises concern to destroy the alien force to maintain equilibrium in the society. The movie though depicts pre Anti –Semitic ideas at the same time it provides fantasy space for the Jews to exist. The Jewish characters are depicted as stereotypes cartoons whereas the German counterparts were held as noble. The film is built around anti Semitism ideas and it reached an epitome of the plot. The success of the movie spread into whole of German with the movie reaching 20 million viewers and was capable enough to motivate the Nazis against the Jews. The movie was commissioned by Joseph Goebbels who was the propaganda minister of the Nazis. The movie was shown to the police personnel’s and the person in charge of the Jewish prisons. The viewers in the concentration camp guards were so inspired by the movie that they treated in an inhumanly manner with all the Jews in the prisons. Even the older German viewers were not apologetic for liking the movie which had such a racial content against the Jews.11 The movie seemed traumatic in nature. The movie delivers a lot of persuasive anti Semitic message and reached a large number of audiences which no anti Semitic media have done before. The role of the protagonist carried out by Ferdinand Marian was also excellently carried out.12 The effectiveness of the film was so huge that it helped to convert a lot of non followers of anti Semitism into the followers of Anti Semitism. The weaving of the story and the plots in the movie made it sure that no amount of space should be provided to the Jews. In order to spread the ideas of the movie throughout it was also screened in pro German countries like that of Spain. The film is also believed to raise more anti-Semitic feelings among the Germans during the war time. There is a presence of significant relation of the movie with that of Holocaust and it relates to the second and third phase of the persecution of the Jews from Germany. The overall popularity of the film raised a trauma of fear among the Jews. The power of movies in stirring a mass of people became evident from this movie. Though the subject of the movie was based on inhumanity still it was popular in unifying the Nazis to carry out their revolt against the Jews in a much bigger way. Conclusion: The complete analysis of the movies reflects their role play in the spread of Anti Semitism. The effective role that film making could play was evident from the study of the two movies. The two movies studied here were different in their content. The first movie studied over here was based on a documentary whereas the second movie was based on a story. However both the movies dealt with the similar subjects. The effectiveness of The Jew Suss was much more in comparison to The Eternal Jew, mainly due to the story building techniques. The popularity of Jew Suss can be attributed to the fact that it was shown among a varied class of Jews. It instigated and motivated a lot of Nazis to increase their brutality against the Jews and finally led to their evacuation from the nation. The content of these two movies were so fierce that both of them were banned from public viewing. The study of the movies also signifies the fact, the extent to which the Jews carried out their hatred against the Jews. The film makers in the era also took part in the movement and became an important force in unifying the people all over. The filmmaker’s efficiency can also be highlighted regarding the elements they chose to criticize each and every activity of the Jews. Their narration was also brutally portrayed in the big screen by the directors which enabled the Nazis to carry out their vengeance against the Jews. The choice of elements and events though were inhuman in nature but it proved appropriate to the situation. Those events and elements stirred the psychology of the Nazis. Another important aspect which can be highlighted from the study of the two movies was the help the movie makers received from the government. In case of the eternal Jew it was Hitler who was gave the final ideas during the editing and had put in his views in order to portray the Jews as mean elements of the world. Similarly in case of the Jew Suss the promotion of the movie was done by the in charge of the Nazi army and the movie was also shown in different parts of the world. The seriousness of the movie lies in the fact that it had negating effects in spreading hatred against a human race and such acts should be prohibited. In the present generation when entertainment is a huge part in modern man’s life such reciprocation of ideas needs to be prevented. The present generation of movie makers should not be inspired to make movies of such content as it is harmful for the whole society and such measures in the artistic field should not be promoted. The two movies studied above should only be studied for analyzing its role play in Anti Semitism and the portrayal of no such events should be inspired. Bibliography: HOLOCAUST ENCYCLOPEDIA, http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10005175, October20, 2011 Linda Schulte-Sasse, Entertaining the Third Reich, Durham, Duke University Press, 1996 Etlin, Richard A. Art, culture, and media under the Third Reich, Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 2002) Connoly, Kate, Jud Suss: the Nazis' inglorious blockbuster, guardian, 25 February, 2010, http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2010/feb/25/jud-suss-film-without-conscience, 20th October, 2011 Haggith, Toby Newman, Joanna Holocaust and the moving image, London, Wallflower Press, 2005 Taylor, Richard, Film propaganda: Soviet Russia and Nazi Germany, New York: I.B.Tauris, 1998 Jew Suss, DVD, directed by Veit Harlan, 1940, Germany: Terra Filmkunst Holocaust Education & Archive Research Team, “Jud Suss”, holocaust research project, http://www.holocaustresearchproject.org/holoprelude/judsuss.html Stig Hornshoj-Moller, “Der ewige Jude”, holocaust- history, http://www.holocaust-history.org/der-ewige-jude/, 20, October, 2011 The Eternal Jew, imdb http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0156524/reviews, 20 October, 2011 The Eternal Jew, DVD, Directed by Hippler, 1940, Germany: Terra Antisemitic,shoah resource centre, Films, Nazi Antisemitic http://www1.yadvashem.org/odot_pdf/Microsoft%20Word%20-%205850.pdf, accessed 20 October, 2011 Read More