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Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

Context. Context is why Downfall is okay and ars_belli's Nazi fetish is not. She's not asking for thoughtful, brutally honest examinations of why Nazism occurred and what lessons we can take from our ancestors' mistakes to do better next time -- you know, the stuff actual Germans often produce when they make media about Nazis. She's asking for things that trivialize a historical tragedy because some of the people involved were sharp dressers.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

+1

And even if she was into the costumes or hurhurhur edgelord most awful dudes make me wet, there's plenty of fictional canons where that itch can be scratched. No, she wants to go for the real deal for the exact same reasons Neo-Nazi's do. The context is the whole thing for her, not the individual aspects that can be found elsewhere.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

I'm not convinced. Er ist wieder da / Look who's back, the German film about Hitler coming back to life, had significant segments with the Hitler actor filming with unknowing members of the public while in character (ie. unscripted on their end) and showed a worryingly unhostile response to him. Obviously nobody thought he was really Hitler, but they were still reacting to him in Hitler-role, not to an actor who was playing Hitler elsewhere and out of his role went out still in costume.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

I don't think that's especially indicative, unless there's more background on this that I don't know. It's not like he was some random person wandering around in an SS uniform. If I saw someone dressed to look like Hitler (and dressed well as "Hitler resurrection in a film" might, not like a shitty Halloween costume) I would naturally assume he was an actor.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

There was some amount of controversy in Germany over it. While a lot of people reacted negatively to the Hitler actor, or just laughed at him, a number of people seemed uncomfortably okay with what he was saying. Which was one of the points of the film -- it's critical of Nazism and Hitler, but also of modern Germans.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

From an English article about the film,

"The cast and crew drove across the country, having Hitler interact with ordinary people. Most of these people react to the sight of one of the 20th century’s vilest leaders with excitement and amusement. They pose for selfies with the feared Nazi leader and perform the famous Hitler salute for him. Even non-European immigrants seemed to be happy to see the Nazi leader, Wnendt said, because “they probably learned about history a little differently.”

Wnendt said that his producers asked him to include more negative reactions in the film, but they couldn’t — only two people responded negatively to Hitler during 300 hours or so of filming. One negative incident, Wnendt said, was when Hitler was driving through Kreuzberg, a Berlin neighborhood known for its leftist leanings, and a man ran over and ripped his hat off. While that scene was not included in the film, another was: In the Bavarian town of Bayreuth, a man walks up to Hitler while he is drawing caricatures of people in a square to express his anger.

[...]

“If you put him on a T-shirt, I think people would buy it,” he said. However, while he expected to find many who found Hitler amusing, Wnendt said he was surprised to find so many people would openly express disgust with immigration and democracy.

When Hitler asked one woman where the problems in Germany are coming from, she immediately pointed to the foreigners who are arriving. Another man tells him that immigrants from Africa are dragging down Germany's average IQ by around 20 percent. “We Germans are not allowed to open our mouths because we still have that stigma,” one man said to Hitler at one point, gesturing behind him.

In one particularly worrying scene, Hitler is easily able to persuade a group of soccer fans to attack another actor making anti-German comments. Wnendt said the crew had not expected it to happen so easily and had to step in to help. “They would really have completely have beaten him up if we hadn’t stopped him,” he said. “It was so easy to get them to do that.”"

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/look-who-s-back-new-film-asking-what-would-happen-it-hitler-returned-to-germany-has-a-worrying-a6706736.html

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

CYRT

Thanks, this is helpful. I don't know if it's that I'm not thinking about it right, or if the person who mentioned it didn't present it helpfully, because to me, someone responding that Germany's problems come from immigrants is a racist attitude whether or not the question is posed by an actor dressed as Hitler, people's willingness to Sieg-heil as a joke is racist even if they're just doing it with their friends, and it's not really about the response to the costume per se.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

And that does honestly raise some serious questions about the ethics of portraying Nazis basically ever. If even people in a country where 'do not be a Nazi, it is the worst thing you can be, please, we are begging you' is part of primary school education will still do this shit at the drop of a hat, maybe every portrayal should be viewed with extreme wariness.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

Damnato memoriae for the Nazis? The problem is that we cannot, both for practical and for ethical reasons, tush up the history of the Nazis.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

NA You can't win with fascists.

Show them like absolute monsters and those of us who hate them see them as monsters, while their fans see everything monstrous they do as great and cool, but at least they hide because they still want the social perks of being seen as normal.

Never talk about them because they're so awful they don't deserve any screentime and their fans will think what they did was fine and there's a silent majority of fascists waiting for the next supreme leader, and they start to become bold about it because they think they're just saying what everyone is thinking.

Making fun of them (in an Inglorious Basterds way or whatever Taika Watiti's new film will be) seems like the best of a hard situation. NYT profiles about how modern Nazi's are complex definitely isn't the way to go, tho.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

A lot of the modern Nazis latched onto Hans Landa from Inglorious Basterds as a 'fun' Nazi, sadly, so even comedic portrayals aren't totally safe. You really do seem to need to portray them consistently as the dumbest, most embarrassing, least intimidating people in the universe for Nazis to not adopt them. Maybe Disney knew what they were doing with Disney Hitler, who knows.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

https://youtu.be/62cPPSyoQkE

I'm inclined to agree with Lindsay Ellis that there's no clear answer on this, though mockery of Nazis a la The Producers seems to work better for discouraging gross fetishizing than serious drama films. If it's purely taboo, then you run into the issue of edgelords like ars_nazi latching onto it.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

I think it should be more worryingly if people just started punching him or whatever it is you wanted to happen. Unless he went out there and actively tried to hurt people, wouldn't it be best if everyone just ignored him?

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

They weren't ignoring him. Some even did the Hitler salute for him.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

If you walk around in Hitler cosplay, people won't like you. People who react to someone in blackface aren't anti-black or racist, they hate the asshole in blackface.

What even? You want people to just live and let live in that situation, even if Hitler walking around could make some people very, very scared that more Nazi stans may pop up and harm them?

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

I think you misread AYRT's comment.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

if someone dumbass with a Hitler mustache and costume is going to make you "very, very scared" you should probably seek professional help.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

nayrt

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unite_the_Right_rally

yeah, no. these losers were out there dressed like nazis.

if you're out in the wild and see someone dressed up like a nazi, it's normal in the modern political climate to look around to make sure a bunch of other losers aren't around the corner with their loser tiki torches.

a moment of fear and alertness, only to later find out its an actor for some movie, is a much smarter move than to assume it's an actor and then get jumped.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

The difference is between "dressed up like a Nazi" and "dressed and made up with great care to look specifically like Hitler." The latter would naturally raise questions that the former would not.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

people dress up like hitler and in klansmen hoods all the time at neonazi rallys.

do you think anyone casually walking around at night during the unite the right rally should have assumed all those losers were making a music video or something ??????

if you've ever been where a movie is filmed, you know that most of the time there are permits posted or someone will flag you down/alert you if you're getting next to a scene being shot because you have to sign a release or walk around. without any notice, random hitler is a big wtf, super accurate or just a guy with a stache and a swastika on his arm.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

"if you're getting next to a scene being shot because you have to sign a release"

In the USA, yes. But plenty of countries don't have that law.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

"Just" a guy with a stache and a swastika on his arm? A guy with a swastika on his arm is a source of concern on his own.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

That's not what was being said, though. They were talking about some movie where an actor went out dressed as Hitler specifically.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

and i'm saying that until you see the camera or filming notice, it's normal to be like wtf and scared if you're a group that the possible hitler cosplayer wouldn't like.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

I feel like it cannot be emphasized enough that it's not so much that she thinks it's okay to trivialize a historical tragedy because some of the people involved were sharp dressers. That's just an excuse that she thinks will render her shit palatable to the rest of us. She really does think the Nazis were great, and for that she should receive nothing but hilarious trollfic for the rest of time.