Posted on 02/25/2006 6:02:52 PM PST by blam
Outcry in Germany as anti-Semitic film sells out
By Tony Paterson in Berlin
(Filed: 26/02/2006)
A virulently anti-Semitic film about the Iraq war has provoked a storm of protest in Germany after it sold out to cheering audiences from the country's 2.5 million-strong Turkish community.
Valley of the Wolves, by the Turkish director Serdan Akar, shows crazed American GIs massacring innocent guests at a wedding party and scenes in which a Jewish surgeon removes organs from Iraqi prisoners in a style reminiscent of the Nazi death camp doctor Joseph Mengele.
US soldiers storm a wedding party in a scene from the film
Bavaria's interior minister admitted last week that he had dispatched intelligence service agents to cinemas showing the film to "gauge" audience reaction and identify potential radicals.
Edmund Stoiber, the state's conservative prime minister, has appealed to cinema operators to remove what he described as "this racist and anti-Western hate film" from their programmes.
The £6 million film, the most expensive Turkish production ever made, had already proved a box office hit in Turkey, where it first opened last month at a gala attended by the wife of the country's prime minister.
The production went on general release in Germany a fortnight ago and has had full houses ever since. More than 130,000 people, most of them young Muslims, saw the film in the first five days of its opening. At a packed cinema in a largely Turkish immigrant district of Berlin last week, Valley of the Wolves was being watched almost exclusively by young Turkish men. They clapped furiously when the Turkish hero of the film was shown blowing up a building occupied by the United States military commander in northern Iraq.
In the closing sequence, the hero is shown plunging a dagger into the heart of a US commander called Sam, played by Billy Zane. The audience responded by standing up and chanting "Allah is great!"
Afterwards, an 18-year-old member of the audience said: "The Americans always behave like this. They slaughtered the Red Indians and killed thousands in Vietnam.
"I was not shocked by the film, I see this on the news every day."
The nature of the film and the enthusiastic reception given to it by young Muslims, has both shocked and polarised politicians and community leaders.
Bernd Neumann, the culture minister in Chancellor Angela Merkel's government complained last week that the reaction to the film "raises serious questions about the values of our society and our ability to instil them".
Kenan Kolat, the head of Germany's Turkish community, insisted that a ban on the film would make matters worse. "If it is withdrawn, it will raise levels of identification with the film," he said. "A democracy must be able to endure films that it doesn't approve of."
Alin Sahin, the film's distributor in Germany, argued: "When a cartoonist insults two billion Muslims it is considered freedom of opinion, but when an action film takes on the Americans it is considered demagoguery. Something is wrong."
But those arguing for a ban on Valley of the Wolves appeared to have won a partial victory last week when Cinemaxx, one of Germany's largest cinema chains, announced that it was withdrawing the film.
...and he doesn't even look Jewish. LOL!
Isn't Turkey supposed to be a U.S. "ally"?? Maybe we should turn over some ports to them too....
They control everything. They're controlling you right now...
When I see this, and the shouting and screaming and "Death to America!" crap, I think of the calls for jihad on American soil when we invaded Iraq, and the subsequent articles about how depressed Middle Easterners were at how swiftly we took Baghdad.
Crowds and terrorist sneaks are one thing. But it's real easy to scream "Death to America!" in a movie theater, and something else entirely to go to war against a nation you know can and will wipe yours out if it needs to. Whatever one thinks of Iraq--and of the violence done to our people by hit-and-run terrorists--the image these people have of us--as a huge, technologically advanced force of murderers--isn't a bad one for instilling fear in those who would never take on such a suicidal course of action like actually going to war against us.
Armchair warriors and generals are not an exclusively American concept.
Read the article, there are Jewish villains, too.
Zane and Busey sold out their country, and now they can stay the Hell out of it. Movies are obviously a great source of propaganda.
The sport of circulating outrageous falsehoods about Americans is out of control. I was shocked in Argentina, in '98, because the natives thought I came to harvest organs of teenagers. I was just a tourist from a cruise ship! This demonization is the hearbeat of the soap operas, tabloids and ultimately, political leaders in socialist and Islamic countries.
The creative void left by Hollywood cowardice is being filled by vile sewage. Mel Gibson, please do a movie on the life of Mohammed.
So all Turks are like these?
Look around--there are plenty of AMERICANS who would pay to see this crap, and would applaud it, too. If we're talking about *fictional* films, look at the box office and critical praise Fahrenheit 9-11 got.
The vermin have their own values that include killing German infidels.
Got mine used with a boatload of extras. Load 5 pistol and 2 rifle calibers.
Exactly! Save your breath and your energy. If they don't see it by now, they won't. The bowels of Hell opened up and spewed forth the demons of Islam! Anyone who doubts that will end up killed by, or bowing to Islam.
Well, Buseybutthead was pretty much forgotten until he agreed to be in this piece of drek...
I spent a year in Turkey during a time when relations between the U.S. and Turkey were relatively good. Since I left, it has acquired an Islamist government. I wouldn't want to go there now.
That blow he took to his head when he was out riding his motorcycle with no helmet didnt help. He needs to ride more witn no helmet. faster and more reckless too.
What's Billy Zane's excuse?
Next time Turkey has a major disaster -- we should stay the heck out!!!
Let the turks cure and solve their own problems == also no further immigration from Turkey or any other islamic nation!!!
I bet they'd do it if the price was right.
So when do we get to burn down Turkish embassies? /sarc
"I was not shocked by the film, I see this on the news every day."
Well, the primary problem is the Muslims, apparently including the Turks. It seems to me that the modern veneer of Kemel Attaturk is slipping, and the Turks are reverting.
But the secondary problem is right here in our decadent western civilization. Who told these arab youts that Americans killed all the Indians? Who told them that they murdered thousands in Vietnam? None other than our American and German leftists. Hollywood and their teachers. They are the ones who have fed this poison of anti-Americanism to people around the world.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.