THE ETERNAL NAZI: A GERMAN AUDIENCE VIEWS ROMAN POLANSKI'S 'THE PIANIST'

The Iconoclast ^ | November 11, 2002 | William E. Grim

[clintonbaiter]

THE ETERNAL NAZI:
A GERMAN AUDIENCE VIEWS ROMAN POLANSKI'S 'THE PIANIST'

by William Grim
Iconoclast Contributing Editor




There's an old joke that inside every German there's a Nazi yearning to get out. While a gross overstatement, there is, I'm unhappy to report, more than a little truth to that old chestnut. But more about that later.

Last week I had the opportunity in Munich to attend a screening of Roman Polanski's new film The Pianist, a film that will not premiere in the United States for another month. This film is based on the true story of the Polish Jewish piano virtuoso Wladyslaw Szpilman, who survived the entire Nazi occupation of Warsaw hiding in the Ghetto and at times being hidden right under the noses of the Nazis in safe houses maintained by the Polish Resistance. Simply put, Polanski's film is a masterpiece. It is considerably better than Schindler's List and is undoubtedly the greatest Holocaust movie of all time. The Pianist has already won the Palm d'Or at Cannes. It deserves to win the Oscar.

What is remarkable about the film is its brutal and unflinching honesty. It avoids the cheap sentimentality that marred the otherwise exemplary Schindler's List. The film also avoids stereotypes as much as possible. Not all of the Jews behave nobly, and one Nazi officer at the end of the film is shown to have at least one spark of humanity left in his otherwise accursed soul. Adrien Brody delivers a stunning performance as Wladyslaw Szpilman, an incredibly demanding role as he is in virtually every scene. The cinematography is brilliant, and even when we are not seeing the title character in action, the events occurring on film are from the point of view of the protagonist, as though we are watching along with him as he peeks out of his hiding places to see Germans murdering Jews just for the sheer sport of it, and later on, Germans getting a taste of their own medicine when the Warsaw Uprising begins.

In addition to exposing the full range of Germanic horrors that made up the Holocaust -- I don't want to give too much of the movie away, but there is one scene in which the Germans summarily execute an entire family of Jews that is so shocking in its brutality that you'll want go home and break every piece of Dresden china in the cupboard and take a sledgehammer to every yuppie scum's Beamer in the parking lot -- The Pianist is a testament to the indefatigable spirit of life that refuses "to go gentle into the night." In particular, the humanizing influence of art, of the will to create, is expertly juxtaposed by Polanski to the German will to destroy, indeed, to the Germanic tendency to embrace all of the negative energy of the universe. In the battle between artistic matter and Germanic anti-matter, it is art that ultimately triumphs.

The execrable German Marxist philosopher Theodor W. Adorno (who is best known today as the model for the character Wendall Kretzschmar, one of the manifestations of the Devil in Thomas Mann's novel Doktor Faustus), once famously remarked that "after Auschwitz there can be no art." Although Adorno was no Nazi (indeed, he spent World War II in exile in Hollywood where he devoted his time to denouncing America and ridiculing American culture, especially "Negro jazz"), his willingness to deny art to those who had been brutalized by his fellow countrymen reveals an arrogance so profound that it is simply beyond the capacity to analyze. It also is a clear demonstration of how easily all Germans (whether of the left or the right) fall into the risible delusion that they somehow constitute a "master race." For what Adorno is really saying is that since German culture has been found wanting no one else may be permitted to seek meaning and solace from art.

There can be only one response to Adorno, and it is found in the final scene of The Pianist. The War is over and life has returned to Warsaw. Wladyslaw Szpilman is performing a concerto accompanied by a full orchestra. No words are spoken, and the scene continues as the credits are rolling. But the message is clear. It is the raised middle finger, proudly held aloft, and it points towards Germany, the remnants of the Nazi Party and Theodor W. Adorno.

Now, back to the Germans yearning to rediscover their inner Nazis. I have to admit that it is a strange experience to watch a Holocaust film in Germany. It's even stranger when you're the only American in the midst of about 200 Germans. But perhaps the strangest thing of all is to watch the reactions of the Germans as the events of the movie unfold. You hear a lot about how Germans are so ashamed today of the behavior of their countrymen during the Nazi period and about how much they've done to atone for their past sins. Don't buy that bill of goods. If the audience of the screening I attended is any indication of German attitudes in general, it doesn't augur well for the future. Remember, this wasn't an audience composed of skinheads from the neo-Nazi enclaves in Karlsruhe and the former DDR. This was a group of Germany's best and brightest: educated, middle class, sophisticated denizens of a major cosmopolitan city.

One scene in particular is seared into my consciousness. It happens about halfway into the film. The Jews of Warsaw have been herded into the Ghetto. A street used by the Germans bisects the Ghetto. While a group of Jews is waiting to cross to the other side of the street, several Nazi thugs force some elderly Jews to dance at an increasingly faster tempo. Weakened by malnutrition, hobbling on crutches, riddled with heart and lung infirmities, many of the Jews fall to the ground in sheer agony. It's a sickening scene. It's the kind of scene that makes you ashamed that your last name is Grim. Hell, it's the kind of scene that makes you ashamed that you listen to Beethoven. If an American soldier had done the same to a German or Jap POW he would have been thrown into the brig for life or cashiered out of the service on a Section 8. But there they were, today's educated, freedom-loving, let's-all-hold-hands-and-love-one-another Germans, laughing at torture.

If there is a more sickening spectacle than Germans finding humor in what their fathers and grandfathers did to the Jews, if there is a more perfect example of the utter lack if humanity at the core of the German nation, I am unaware of it. There is something terribly wrong with Germany and the German Volk. The German soul is a deep abyss, a fetid, stinking morass that befouls the community of nations. But wait, there's more.........

[clintonbaiter]

More biting Iconoclast commmentary. William Grim at his best.

[marty60]

Sadly, it is not a German "thing". The ability to make excuses for vicious, evil , murderous men is alive in every human, if we allow the dark side to consume us. Witness yesterday's news conference by the "Hollywood elite". They are very comfortable with the evil Saddam murdering families, raping as state policy, dipping victims in vats of acid.

The sad thing is that most Americans will just shrug and say "oh it's just those spoiled Hollywood types" Just as many Germans stood by as their neighbors were disappearing in the dead of night.

[joesnuffy]

If there is a more sickening spectacle than Germans finding humor in what their fathers and grandfathers did to the Jews, if there is a more perfect example of the utter lack if humanity at the core of the German nation, I am unaware of it. There is something terribly wrong with Germany and the German Volk. The German soul is a deep abyss, a fetid, stinking morass that befouls the community of nations. But wait, there's more.........

Indeed there is... more.... and from their Islamic-Satanic fellow travelers... A List Of Sites With Alternative Views On Islam

[dpa5923]

Self-ping for later read.

[Celtjew Libertarian]

Over the last years, I'd started to think that, with the youngest WW2 Nazis in their 70s, it was time to move on with regard to Germany. In the past year or so, I've been having second thoughts.

[SoCal Pubbie]

As someone who's last name is of German derivation, I can tell you I am never ashamed of it. I am not German. When asked what nationality my name is, I reply "American". It drives my wife nuts when I saw that, but she just doesn't get it.

[ecomcon]

Bump.

An object lesson on how the will is unable to reform the soul. The German abandonment of orthodox Christianity continues to be an bellwether.

The rot is eternal and universal to mankind. No amount of political correctness can stop it. Can we be very far behind them?

[xp38]

Polanski huh? This is high praise for his latest movie. How do we approach this work by someone who had relations with young girl? I could be wrong but I think she was 13.

[1rudeboy]

The irony of stigmatizing an entire ethnic group while writing a review of a film about the Holocaust clearly is lost on Mr. Grim.

[Timesink]

Remember, this wasn't an audience composed of skinheads from the neo-Nazi enclaves in Karlsruhe and the former DDR. This was a group of Germany's best and brightest: educated, middle class, sophisticated denizens of a major cosmopolitan city.

Translation: Liberals.

[AshleyMontagu]

I believe there have been something like 150 movies made about the Holocaust in the last 20 years. Maybe some of these folks in the theater have become a bit tired of being beaten over the head about something they had nothing to do with. That and the fact that Polanski has even less moral currency than Woody Allen may have led some to not go into self-flagellation mode during the screening.

[1rudeboy]

But perhaps the strangest thing of all is to watch the reactions of the Germans as the events of the movie unfold.

Normally I don't talk back to the screen at the movies, but I do have to admit that I did yell out " U S A" and pumped my fist in the air when the Szpilman family listened to the announcement on the radio that the United States had declared war on Germany. And I also do have to admit that it felt mighty fine to yell out "Shoot those damn Nazis!" when the film showed the Jews starting to fight back during the Warsaw Uprising.

_____
Fascinating. I would imagine that he was baiting the audience from nearly the beginning.

[1rudeboy]

Over the last years, I'd started to think that, with the youngest WW2 Nazis in their 70s, it was time to move on with regard to Germany. In the past year or so, I've been having second thoughts.

On the other hand, and by Mr. Grim's own admission, more than 200 Germans went to see a Holocaust film in Munich. Hardly behavior one would expect from people "yearning to discover their inner Nazis."

[Defiant]

Most American Germans emigrated to America before 1850, with large waves in the 1600s and 1700s. They were farmers and artisans, and they came with very little. They tended to go to the North, Pennsylvania and New York, and from there, migrated westward across the north to form the bedrock of the midwest. Many were pacifists, and those that were not were not bellicose. Their cultural views had been significantly affected by the long religious wars in Germany following Luther. They were at the forefront of the abolition movement, they were the ones who favored a gentle peace following the civil war (the Puritans of New England being the ones who wanted to break the south), they created the progressive movement, and their ancestors continue to bedevil us with their middle of the road Midwestern outlook, which sometimes swings left and sometimes right. They are the swing vote in America.

Germany itself had a major cultural shift following the industrial revolution and accellerating with unification in 1870. The Germans by 1914 were a different people, Prussian in outlook, bellicose, nationalist and possessing of a societal inferiority complex that manifested itself in 1933 through the Nazis and their theories that proclaimed themselves a master race.

In both world wars, our Germans, calm, reasoned, determined and mild-mannered, fighting on behalf of an Anglo-Saxon cultural offshoot that they had adopted entirely, beat their Germans handily. Pershing and Eisenhower are but 2 examples of many German-Americans who defeated Germany as Americans. As of the 20th Century, in fact, German-Americans were the largest ethnic group in America, and so provided the bulk of the fighting force that won the wars.

(As an aside, unlike Muslims presently, there was never a question of German-American loyalty when fighting Germans. During WW1, there were some Germans who favored Germany over the Allies, but these were recent emigrants, and there was very little disloyal behavior once the US entered the war.) The point is, Germany's culture that led to Nazism was forged in only a few decades, from the early 1800s to early 1900's. It is not inherent in the traditional German character or embedded within Germanic DNA, as our country's experience with Germans demonstrates conclusively. If Nazi tendencies are re-emerging, it is because some strain of thought that arose in the last 150 years continues to be passed around in that country. That, like the madrassas in Pakistan, is what needs to be attacked, if it appears that Germany could possibly be once again seduced by the ideology of idiotic racial politics.

[Blake#1]

Your history is incomplete. World War II began after World War I. The Germans got an armistice in 1918 and were then forced to accept defeat. This was an humiliation to ALL GERMANS. It did not matter whether Hitler or anyone else came to power, Germans wanted to correct this injustice. Crap like this movie review only brings out the desire for revenge on the part of Germans. They are getting a little revenge by not supporting us in our latest action. This is another attack on the USofA's CULTURE, LANGUAGE, AND BORDERS.

[expatpat]

As far as I can see, US jews have moved on long ago: they favor Mercedes and BMWs as their cars of choice. If I were a jew, I would never buy a German car.

[The Great Satan]

Oh, I don't know. If Hitler had won back in 1945, we wouldn't have had all these problems over all these years either. I'm sure Germans are secretly quite proud of voting for him.

[Defiant]

Of course the terms of the armistice in 1918 contributed to the rise of Nazism. But by 1914, the Prussian mentality had taken hold of all Germany. Hitler took advantage of a situation that already existed, one that was merely exacerbated by economic conditions. Had Hitler not come around, extreme German nationalism could have easily come about in some other guise in the milieu of the early 1930s.

You cannot explain away Hitler simply by pointing to the treaty that Germans accepted after losing a war. Remember, the allies, with the US, were poised to march into Germany, the way we finally had to do in WW2. They wanted to prevent that, and so accepted an agreement that they didn't like. Humiliating? Well, don't lose wars and you won't be humiliated. Lose, and that's life. Get over it, don't obsess over it. WWI is certainly no jusfification for instituting a hideously immoral, inhuman regime. In our own depression, people suffered, but there was never a serious tendency towards fascism, even among our Germans and Italians. Why? Because we had a culture (political and social) where fascism could find few adherents (except in Hyannisport).

I don't think this movie review was crap. I am glad that someone is out there reporting, even anecdotally, German attitudes that we may not be aware of here in the US. Some of us who thought the Germans had been reformed may need a little disabusing of that notion. It's like a heads up, just like all the anti-semitic violence going on in Europe these days. There could be trouble down the line.

[stumpy]

While not having seen the movie, I have read the book. It is based on a true story. It is an excellant book, and I look forward to seeing the movie.

[Thud]

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