There's a home movie in this documentary of several stuffed animals hanging from a rack, almost as if they're in nooses, and then being set on fire. I believe this occurs while the narration is saying something about the German soldiers doing horrible things to the Russian Jews, but I can't remember.
What on earth is going on in the home movie? Why is someone burning hanging stuffed animals in effigy?
It was a bizarre scene. The context was German atrocities on the Russian front and one of the German officers who was by implication involved somehow in those atrocities.
shareIt was an extract taken from some German dude's journal when he was in Russia. "We marched in to Russia. Murdered the Jews. We strangled the women. Killed the children. Everybody knows what we bring". That footage with that narration is pretty disturbing. They published the dudes journals after the war.
http://www.amazon.com/Stranger-Myself-Inhumanity-Russia-1941-1944/dp/0374139784
Donnie youre out of your element
Right. The voice over was about the goings-on in Russia, but the home video seemed to be in someone's German back yard. So what's going on there? Or is it footage of some really bizarre stuff going on on the Russian front? And why? I just cannot figure out what the context of that video is. I agree it's powerful with the voiceover. I just wish I knew what the original context of the home movie was.
shareThe context is German soldiers returning on leave, back to "normality" trying to live with themselves after what they have done and what they will most certainly do again.
It's not as if they can start telling their family and friends that they are murdering civilians; men, women and even children! So this scene is some troubled soldier's attempt to record his state of mind and his remorse.
Without a doubt the best scene of the documentary.
Or it was another family of Germans actually burning effigies of Jews with their children. For every story of a troubled soldier unable to tell his family there was another soldier rejoicing with their family at the impending destruction of the inhuman Jewry.
Everyone seems to think their was no complicity in Germany only secrets, but trust me after a decade of brainwashing ideologies appearing in every medium there would be a lot of Germans who saw Jews as pure evil and who would happily burn effigies of them. Kristalnacht proves that.
You can say that only the SS committed atrocities and that your average German soldier would be repulsed, but 90% of Germany's 6th Army were regular Wehrmacht soldiers and when the severity order was handed down to kill Jews on the spot no one batted an eyelid. That order would later be sent through all 3 Army groups operating on the eastern front.
Maybe Germans only had a hatred of Russian Jews and merely had a slight dislike of German ones?
You don't know sh!t, Jon Snow!
I also found the reading of some of the letters were read with emphasis to support shame and regret, or at least an air of thinking twice.
But the words could have easily been read a different way.
Like when the letter was sent home from the Russian front.
The author said they killed the children, slaughtered the old men and raped the women. Everyone knows what we bring.
The actor read it to make it sound like the author was ashamed.
But read the words and pretend to say them with pride and aggression.
They have a very different tone when read that way.
This series did that with written words throughout. I kept wondering how they knew to read them in the manner they did. Afterall, just like on the Internet today, tone and intention is often misread.
I'm sure some quotes were read differently than the writer intended, but again, they are just quotes from a larger letter or journal. It is possible they got that the quote should be read as shameful or regretful because the entirety of the letter we don't hear is written that way.
shareVery true.... orrrrrr they did it to fit a narrative. A narrative that wanted to tell the world even the NAZIs were filled with shame as to what they were doing.
We will never know without reading full letters. News media does this stuff all the time.
MSNBC will take a few words spoken by some Republican out of context and then go on about how horrible it was to say such things. Fox news will do the exact same thing with speeches of dems. We all know what they're doing yet it goes on without much, if any, retribution.
Knowing how easily it is done even in today's world of instantaneous ability for people to go look at the whole speech, I always wonder when seeing or hearing things like I did in the readings of hand picked phrases out of what are probably long and informative letters sent home by 'proud' soldiers.
I know this is off topic but I gotta say it. 1.) This is one of my all time favorite documentaries. I have learned so much from it and yet it breaks my heart every time. 2.) I freaking LOVE your username! I am a BIG anime/cosplay fan and Utena is one of my all time favorites! I have wanted to cosplay Anthy Himemiya for YEARS, but I never got her Rose Bride gown made. Still... to me, Utena is a "Shojo-Ai/Yuri" classic! I hope to see you around!
shareSame - I actually watch this documentary at least once or twice a year. It is pretty violent, otherwise I think I'd watch it more. It is just so well done and so fascinating.
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The Germans thought the Slavs and Bolsheviks were sub-human/animals.
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