German movies about the Nazi dictatorship are usually heavily subsidised, but nothing to write home about (which actually goes for most German movies these days). "Jud Süß -- Film ohne Gewissen" by Oscar Roehler stands out because it tries to go beyond the simplistic message that "the Nazis were evil". Instead it honestly tries to explore the fact why an actor who didn't sympathise with the Nazis nevertheless chose to play lead in Veit Harlan's antisemitic "masterpiece". We witness Ferdinand Marian getting sucked deep into the heart of darkness. Oscar Roehler also takes a good look at the sexual life of the fascist bohème, with an impressive performance by Gudrun Landgrebe, who looks unbelievably foxy despite her sixty years of age.
This was also the only movie I can think of that displays survivors of the Nazi death machine not as saintly survivors but as brutalised human beings.
That said, I take umbrage at four aspects of this movie:
* the -- pardon my French -- overly drastic fellatio scene between Goebbels and housemaid Britta, who wears a golden swastika pendant to hammer home the fact that she's a Nazi slag (and while I'm at it, the actress playing her, Anna Unterberger, is far to blonde and svelte for a realistic housemaid)
* in the movie, Ferdinand Marian's wife Anna is a "semi-Jewess" who is eventually murdered by the Nazis while Marian lives the high life of a Nazi A-list actor; in reality she wasn't Jewish (although she had previously been married to a Jew and in consequence her daughter was "half Jewish"), and survived her husband by three years; in my book, that alteration was hammy and unfair game
* unlike displayed in the movie, Marian probably died in an "ordinary" traffic accident and didn't commit suicide
* I didn't get the scene where Marian is in a nightclub in Prague with a transvestite; also, in that same scene we see a German soldier firing into the crowd with his Luger, a histrionic scene which would have resulted in carnage plus a court martial for the shooter
You have to view these criticisms in the light that this movie was booed at the Berlinale, ostracised by many critics, and the highest Jewish representative in Germany even called for it to be banned. Of course everyone is free to dislike and criticise this movie, but I simply don't understand what caused this massive rejection of a serious, well-made and captivating movie.
PS: for reference, if you want a movie that really deals with Nazism in an inappropriate manner, check out "Der Vorleser".
