Do any of us learn from history?
Listen to the words of the inebriated German officer during the torture scenes. He understands the seeds of enduring hatred being sown, disapproves, but does nothing except hide in an apathetic stupor.
Recognize any modern day parallels?
Of course not. But if you are trying to make a comparison of then and now, you need to crack open a few more history books.
--Heather
http://www.scarlettsweb.net
Delia perhaps you should pay more attention to the world around you. The names, locations and faces change but the misery, despair and all too brief happiness continues to repeat and have always done so.
A parallel could be found to every event in history. Usually more than one. And yes, many seeds of the most insidious moments in our past can be found sprouting in our world right now.
.
I do see parallels in the German officers attitude and certain members of todays media and congress.
"Whenever Mrs. Kissell breaks wind, we beat the dog."
Hopefully you're not comparing a country that envisioned massacring and enslaving the rest of the world 80 years to a country today that gives billions in humanitarian aid to other countries that profess to hate and despise the hand that feeds them. That makes me want to hide in an apathetic stupor.
I think 80 years ago, people hated and despised because there were great atrocities being committed to them. Today they hate because it's the cool thing to do and people love jumping on a bandwagon. No parallel, just the idiocy of today.
Right, there was no 'bandwagon' sociological phenomena taking place 80 years ago. Humans have all somehow changed in an instant very recently - take the world today, where no longer do any 'massacres' or 'atrocities' occur to drive humanity's vicious cycle of vengeance, anger, and hate - which are now all just fads for people to look 'cool'. Real-life 'violence' must be nothing more than a fashionable trend started by retro-crazed teenagers hanging out in places like Syria, Colombia, and Mali listening to too much rock and roll and trying to mimic the trendy images of 1935-1945. Riiiiiiiight
Next year they'll all be going ape for a drought/famine/misery phase and dying slowly and painfully will be the new in-thing!
No. Just no. My post was directed at America, which is not massacring or committing atrocities, and the hate that is directed at America. Murder-level hate being directed at a people who are not putting others in concentration camps, not exterminating populations, IS providing food, money, aid, etc... TO people who ARE suffering.
share
Actually let us direct it at America. The shoe certainly fits.
As an aside, your naivety is astonishing and you should probably get that checked out.
Uncle Sam is pretty much the world's largest (by volume) abuser of freedom now. China isn't even as successful as the US in manipulation and curtailing freedom. Oh and there ARE massacres, torture, atrocities inflicted by Americans upon innocent people who don't have the power to defend themselves against the rolling onslaught of this seemingly unstoppable juggernaut. That is a familiar sound too. Lessons were learned from the Nazis by these fascists in America. Obviously methods will change, so the fact there are no concentrations camps now is a useless argument. No concentration camps besides those which are accepted by the media as legitimate anyway. It is common knowledge if you choose to seek it, that half or more of the hostages in Guantanamo are innocent people. Pretty much just like you and me and anyone we know. Have a wife and kids at home, live a life the best way they know. Difference is you and I are sitting here typing meaningless crap on the internet while they are languishing in a torture camp and not even allowed access to the same human rights most prisoners in any other part of the world will receive. Perhaps the innocent people dying by drone strikes are lucky by comparison, but that would be a twisted definition of luck if you ask me.
The U.S. is so enthusiastically and theatrically evil and disgusting that these eager beavers use their own taxpayers' money to fund their human rights violations against their own people. The NSA is between 10 to 20% dedicated to digging up elements of the malleable concept of terrorism and the rest of their merry work is focused on you and me. The ultimate end is that no one has the right to privacy and of living a life of freedom anymore.
America deserves all the dirt that it is currently being covered with. The world HAS seen abuses of power and epic manipulations of its populace at different points in history...and it is also seeing it now. All empires eventually fall too and the thugs and criminals at the heart of the corruption and abuse always answer for what they've done. The butthurt feeling in the US government over the last 6-8 months and their subsequent visible spoiled brattish behavior and embarrassing mistakes are merely the most visible signs that the decline is well under way.
.
Ahh...America-bashing. The only kind of acceptable bashing in the world arena.
shareAmerica, which is not massacring or committing atrocitiesThat's simply not true and it appalls me you want to pretend otherwise.
I give my respect to those who have earned it; to everyone else, I'm civil.share
I know what you are thinking. Only Liberals think "waterboarding" and "enhanced interrogation techniques" are the equivalent of real torture. You were all (including Feinstein) calling for far worse after 9/11. You guys make me sick!
shareUh---what? They ARE real torture,you idiot! But a brainwashed right-wing nut like you is too stupid to admit that!
share[deleted]
In my modest opinion this was (is) a propaganda film. On august 1943, Rome was declared Open City by the Italian government to avoid destruction by the allied bombers.
The Germans abandoned the city to preserve his heritage according to the Protocol of the Geneva Conventions that explicitly states as forbidden the attack of any non-defended localities. The Germans declared also Florence and Chieti as open cities for the same reason. Otherwise Paris, Rome, Florence and other European cities would have been destroyed as the Monastery at Monte Cassino was by the Allies insanity.
In 1945 the only possibility for Italy to produce a film was according to the American Forces directives, otherwise "Roma città aperta" by Rosselini would never have been produced. All films were censored in post-war Europe.
And yes, there were war crimes in Rome as always happen during wars.
Considerations aside this was a great film by Rosselini. But, answering your question, yes there are lots of modern day parallels.
Yes, it is. It was made as the war was ending or over and I think they may even have used German POWs as extras. The Germans are a little nuanced as characters but are all pretty evil, except for the deserting officer who is merely weak. A few of the actors had been in pro-fascist films. For example, the actor portraying the priest who accompanies one of the main characters to his execution had played a priest in an Italian film a few years earlier, but this was a fascist film depicting the priest confronting evil communist atheists.
And yes, there are modern parallels.
"Chicken soup - with a *beep* straw."
In vino veritas
When he is well sozzled in the officer's clubroom, Hartmann speaks with some insight. Though, when he is sober the next day and presiding over an execution, he is just another Nazi.
"Chicken soup - with a *beep* straw."