What is the source movie for the "Hitler finds out..." meme?
October 5, 2011 9:34 PM Subscribe
You know those "Hitler finds out..." videos that are cropping up everywhere? What movie is that clip from?
I'm talking about videos like these.
I'm talking about videos like these.
It's a really fantastic movie. You should watch it.
posted by The Lamplighter at 9:41 PM on October 5, 2011 [2 favorites]
posted by The Lamplighter at 9:41 PM on October 5, 2011 [2 favorites]
It's pervasive enough that there's a tag. The latter one on the blue includes a 2005 thread about the original movie.
posted by XMLicious at 9:53 PM on October 5, 2011
posted by XMLicious at 9:53 PM on October 5, 2011
Here's a link to the original with English subtitles.
posted by WalkingAround at 9:55 PM on October 5, 2011 [1 favorite]
posted by WalkingAround at 9:55 PM on October 5, 2011 [1 favorite]
(btw, you ought to add the "downfall" tag to this post.)
posted by XMLicious at 9:58 PM on October 5, 2011
posted by XMLicious at 9:58 PM on October 5, 2011
Hitler, by the way, is played by the wonderful Bruno Ganz^.
posted by dhartung at 11:15 PM on October 5, 2011
posted by dhartung at 11:15 PM on October 5, 2011
Seconding sbutler here. A great piece of work, particularly by Bruno Ganz. Really gives you the sense of paranoia, depression, and fear that surely pervaded Hitler's bunker in 1945.
posted by kuanes at 4:23 AM on October 6, 2011
posted by kuanes at 4:23 AM on October 6, 2011
It's a spectacular movie, especially the scene that's been appropriated for the Hitler meme. Happily I saw it well before the meme started, because I'm not sure if that scene has the same impact the first time you watch it if you've already been desensitized by a thousand YouTube parodies.
It's an uncomfortable movie in many ways, because it does present the Nazi high command as human beings (and still monsters at the same time), which is not nearly as easy to deal with as if they were simply inhuman monsters.
Possibly the single most surreal aspect of it for me is that I know Bruno Ganz best from Wim Wenders Wings of Desire, where he's wonderful as the angel Damiel. It's a little tricky to reconcile that with "wonderful as Adolf Hitler" (which he also is).
posted by McCoy Pauley at 8:10 AM on October 6, 2011
It's an uncomfortable movie in many ways, because it does present the Nazi high command as human beings (and still monsters at the same time), which is not nearly as easy to deal with as if they were simply inhuman monsters.
Possibly the single most surreal aspect of it for me is that I know Bruno Ganz best from Wim Wenders Wings of Desire, where he's wonderful as the angel Damiel. It's a little tricky to reconcile that with "wonderful as Adolf Hitler" (which he also is).
posted by McCoy Pauley at 8:10 AM on October 6, 2011
Nthing the recommendation that you should watch it.
posted by Silvertree at 8:29 AM on October 6, 2011
posted by Silvertree at 8:29 AM on October 6, 2011
Apparently the director of the film, Oliver Hirschbiegel, really gets a kick out of the parodies.
I think it's good as a film and (mostly) good as history, but some things are problematic. The SS doctor Ernst-Günther Schenck is presented by the film as a sympathetic character, caring about the population of Berlin even as Hitler and the higher-ups are leaving them to the ravages of the Soviets. However, Schenck had served on the Eastern Front and was involved in human experimentation.
That said, this parody of Hitler as a history teaching assistant (a gig I had for 3 years) is pitch-perfect.
posted by dhens at 2:32 PM on October 6, 2011
I think it's good as a film and (mostly) good as history, but some things are problematic. The SS doctor Ernst-Günther Schenck is presented by the film as a sympathetic character, caring about the population of Berlin even as Hitler and the higher-ups are leaving them to the ravages of the Soviets. However, Schenck had served on the Eastern Front and was involved in human experimentation.
That said, this parody of Hitler as a history teaching assistant (a gig I had for 3 years) is pitch-perfect.
posted by dhens at 2:32 PM on October 6, 2011
Bruno Ganz is in every German-set movie, actually. He was a professor in "The Reader," he was in "The Baader-Meinhof Complex," and he was a kind of P.I. in the recent Liam Neeson movie "Unknown."
I recall a NPR interview with him about "Untergang/Downfall," and he said that, owing to the peculiarities of Berlin streets, his trailer was about 3 blocks from the shooting location. So he'd get out of his trailer looking like Hitler's twin, and meekly walk 3 blocks through Berlin to get to the location. He also said that his goal was for people to recognize Hitler's humanity, not as an evil devil-spawn, so that they would see that his actions, and his evils, were every bit human.
posted by Sunburnt at 2:52 PM on October 6, 2011
I recall a NPR interview with him about "Untergang/Downfall," and he said that, owing to the peculiarities of Berlin streets, his trailer was about 3 blocks from the shooting location. So he'd get out of his trailer looking like Hitler's twin, and meekly walk 3 blocks through Berlin to get to the location. He also said that his goal was for people to recognize Hitler's humanity, not as an evil devil-spawn, so that they would see that his actions, and his evils, were every bit human.
posted by Sunburnt at 2:52 PM on October 6, 2011
Response by poster: Thank you! That was driving me insane. I was having a hard time searching for it because every search term I used just returned a bunch more meme videos and never the actual movie.
posted by sramsey at 6:41 PM on October 10, 2011
posted by sramsey at 6:41 PM on October 10, 2011
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by Admiral Haddock at 9:35 PM on October 5, 2011 [1 favorite]