Nazis and the Cinema

by Susan Tegel

Before the rise of television, the cinema was a key medium of entertainment and information. The Nazi regime, which inherited the largest film industry outside Hollywood, realised this, with some of the most memorable images of Hitler and his party coming from Leni Riefenstahl's film Triumph of the Will. Susan Tegel has written a comprehensive account of the films made in Nazi Germany from 1933 to 1945, including the notorious feature film, Jud Süss, and the compilation documentary Der Ewige Jude. She explores in detail how the film makers were controlled and used by the regime and examines other less well-known films featuring Jewish characters and how their image differed from film to film. She also looks at the industry itself, its reorganization, funding, the interventions of the Propaganda Ministry headed by Goebbels, the compromises which people had to make, the careerism and the dangers which some faced either of unemployment or worse.

Genres: Film

342 pages, Paperback

First published August 1, 2007

Reviews

[Last Chance Saloon]

This is a detailed account of cinema in Germany during the Third Reich.

Chapters:
1. Hitler: Image Building
2. Nazi Propaganda
3. The German Film Industry to 1918
4. Weimar Cinema
5. The German Film Industry 1933-1945
6. The Kampfzeit Films, 1933
7. Leni Riefenstahl's Triumph Of The Will
8. A Judenfrei Cinema: 1934-1938
9. Two German Comedies (1939)
10. The Rothschilds and Jus Suss
11. Der ewige Jude (1940)
12. The Second World War
13. Film and the Final Solution
14. Theresienstadt
15. Liberation

This is a well written, largely unbiased and interesting book that I would only recommend to historians or those studying/who have studied film history.

[Bernie4444]

Films made in Nazi Germany from 1933 to 1945

The book ay has concentrated on a hand full of Nazi films but it sure mentions many other films and you can make a list to get. An example is Reinhard Shunzel’s “Victor und Victoria” 1933 (I bought my copy from Amazon.de)

The is a small section of black-and-white photos in the center of the book.

No footnotes at the bottom of the page so you have to keep your finger in the notes section at the end of the book.

There is a filmography at the end of the book (no writing in the margins.)

After reading this book your next target should be "The UFA Story: A History of Germany's Greatest Film Company 1918-1945"