Anti-Semitism in film. “The banality of evil.”

Excerpted from Deutsche Welle 3.30.2019

Even before the Nazis’ rise in 1933, anti-Semitism was present in film. After 1945, many directors struggled to deal with the Holocaust, but some continued to make movies with anti-Semitic tendencies.

Photo above – Schindler’s List (1993)

Anti-Semitism on Film II DW 3.30.2019

Margarethe von Trotta’s film about Hannah Arendt was well received in 2012. The director sketched a balanced portrait of the philosopher and publicist who, in the 1960s, grappled with a figure who was largely responsible for the Nazi genocide: Adolf Eichmann. Arendt coined the phrase “the banality of evil” to explain anti-Semitism clothed in seemingly harmless bureaucracy.

https://www.dw.com/en/why-hitler-watched-hollywood-films/a-48062877

Leave a comment