A Nice Nazi? You Must Be Joking!

Rating: 8/10 (31 July 2005)

This is a great movie. It is a story that had to be told. As unbelievable as it is, even a Nazi was capable of showing compassion, of pausing to stop and explore his own conscience and make decisions that saved people from death. This Nazi had every incentive to dispose of his charges yet decides not to it and instead takes the high road with dramatic results. Counterposed to him was another Nazi who wantonly murdered people and in the paid for that with his life. Yes, two Nazis, one guided by the highest principles, the other who was devoid of even the slightest spark of kindness, both Germans, yet both different. Why? Who knows?
I know that everyone raved about this movie and how it was Spielberg's greatest and most important movie. Well, guess what: I don't need Hollywood giving me a history lesson on the Holocaust or trying to capitalize on the suffering the victims of that event had to endure. I don't need a Hollywood producer or director trying to manipulate into thinking that some Nazi really had second-thoughts about the plight of the Jews ... many of whom happened to be German too. If you want to watch a really good movie about where the German people were at when it came to Nazism, watch the "Mortal Storm" made in 1940, or watch any of Leni Reifenstahl's documentaries glorifying the Nazi system. These movies were made when the Nazis were actually in power. But don't tell me decades after the war that there were Nazis with a conscience because if that had been the case, Adolf Hitler would not have lasted one day in office. Hitler could not have done what he did if he did not have the unanimous approval of EVERY Nazi who followed his lead. A Nazi who cared? Yeah ... right. The next thing Hollywood will be telling us is the Genghis Khan wasn't such a bad guy or that Isaac the Terrible wasn't all that terrible, just misunderstood and blah, blah blah. If Hollywood thinks the story ... any story ... will make money, they'll try to exploit it for all its worth. Now, what I really want to know, however, is why was the movie filmed in black-and-white? Were concentration camps painted in black-and-white paint? Were the inmates black-and-white? Or the guards? I don't think so. And that concentration-camp commandant who's taking pot-shots at the inmates? Was that supposed to tell us that the Nazis were depraved wanton murderers? Once again, I don't need this movie to tell me that. I know that. Plus that subject was fully covered in "Judgment at Nuremberg" which did a much better job of it, minus all the gratuitous violence. So if you want to watch a black-and-white movie about a Nazi, who, for reasons never explained, decides to protect Jews and also shows Jews being subjected to all forms of mistreatment and violence and terror, then this is the movie for you. But for goodness sake, don't construe this movie as being a history lesson because if you do, you'll come away believing that some Nazis were actually nice, and there's no way I'll ever believe that.