Conspiration

It was just as Hitler tasted defeat at the Russian front, that a little known meeting was arranged to mark one of the worst events in humankind. That meeting, known as the Wannsee Conference, was to put into motion the evacuation of the Jews from Germany, then the rest of their controlled territories.

15 officials from various departments were in attendance, chaired by SS Chief of Security Reinhard Heydrich (Kenneth Branagh) and SS Major Adolf Eichmann (Stanley Tucci), and has in its members several lawmakers and doctors. They sit and debate (well, not much of a debate actually) the notion of evacuating (read: Eliminate) the Jews, and you'll probably witness how casual it all sounded to some of the members.

It was interesting to see how Heydrich cajoled everyone into agreeing to his plans, by hook or by crook. And it's very chilling to see how semantics were danced about, and how methods were discussed as if it was a process so trivial - the building of concentration camps, the techniques of gassing and how to perform it, the statistics of the kill that would have them reach their target numbers intended.

Based on a surviving record of that meeting, despite the fact that the minutes are to be read, memorized and destroyed, this HBOfilm is a good watch to peek into the decision making process, into that stain in human history, and the unthinkable evil that humans are capable of.

If you're a fan of Downfall, then perhaps this depiction of history will interest you.

This excellent co-production by HBO and BBC is based on real-life deeds and previously shot in i984 a German film by Heinz Schirk .It concerns about the meeting of high-ranking Nazi SS and civilian leaders at the Wannsee Conference held on January 20,1942, to plan the Final Solution of the Jewish question. This interesting, important movie depicting, in real time, the conference during which 14 members of the Nazi hierarchy decided in eighty five minutes the logistics and means of effecting the Final Solution. The film is magnificently played by complete casting. Special mention to Kenneth Branagh as cold General Reinhard Heydrich, Colin Firth as dubious Dr Stuckard, Ian McNiece as the fat Dr Klopfer, David Threlfall as the regretted Dr Kritzinger and Kevin McNally as undersecretary Martin Luther . The picture is accurately adapted by Loris Mandel based on the Wannsee Protocol. Furthermore evocative cinematography by Stephen Goldblatt. This TV movie is well directed by Frank Pierson, a prestigious screenwriter and director.

Adding more details along with the well developed on the movie, the deeds were happened of the following manner:

The meeting took place in the Berlin suburb of Grossen-Wannsee, where the decision was made to adopt the Final Solution, the contemplated extermination of Jews . On Julio 31, 1941, Herman Goering issued orders to Reinhard Heydrich,chief of the SD, the security service , to submit a comprehensive plan of the Jewish question. The meeting was originally scheduled for December 8,1941, but it was to be postpones until noon on January 20, 1942. It was to be followed by a luncheon. Fifteen Nazi bureaucrats were present. Minutes of meeting taken in Protocol that read in part: ¨As a further possibility of solving the question, the evacuation of the Jews of the east can now be substituted for emigration ,after obtaining permission from the Fuehrer to that effect.However ,these actions are merely to be considered as alternative possibilities, even though they will permit us to make all those practical experiences of great importance for the future final solution of the Jewish question. The Jews should in the course of the Final Solution betaken in a suitable manner to the east for use as labor. In big labor gangs ,separated by sex. The Jews capable of work will be brought these areas for road building, in which task undoubtedly a large number will fall through natural diminution. The remnant that is finally able to survive all this must be treated accordingly, since these people, representing a natural selection, are to be regarded as the germ cell a new Jewish development, in case they should succeed and go free. This remnant survivor is undoubtedly the part with the strongest resistance. And they go free as history has proved. In the course of the execution of the Final solution , Europe will be combed from West to east¨.

The conference was opened by Heydrich, who declared that he was the plenipotentiary for the final of the Jewish question. He then reviewed the emigration problem. Until this time a plan had been held in readiness to deport all Jews to the island of Magadascar, off the coast of Africa, but the Madagascar Plan had fallen through after the invasion of the USSR on June,22,1941. There was no longer any possibility of transporting Jews in this fashion. Instead of emigration the Fueherer had given his sanction for the evacuation of all Jews to the East as a solution possibility. The evacuees would be organized into huge labor columns. Undoubtedly, a majority would fall through natural diminution. The survivors of this natural selection process, actually the hard core of Jewry and the most dangerous because they could rebuild the Jewish life,would be treated accordingly. Although Heydrich did not elaborate the phrase ¨treated accordingly¨the plain meaning was that, in the course of time,with insufficient food and exhausting work, the survivors would be weakened and ready for the specially equipped extermination camps. The conferees then became involved in a lengthy discussion of the problem of the individuals of mixed race, and that of Jews in mixed marriages. About the half the time was taken up with this special discussion, but not drastic reclassification was made. Then the conferees adjourned for lunch. Thirty copies of the record were made and circulated in the ministries and SS offices. News of the Final Solution traveled quickly through the Nazi bureaucracy. Within a few months the first gas chamber camps were set up in Poland. The events are known as Wannsee Protocol by Martin Luther's copy of the Conference minutes was discovered in the files of the German Foreign by American investigators in 1947.It is the only record of the meeting that survives. Destination of the Conference participants is the following : Reinhard Heydrich killed in Praga. Gestapo Chied Heinrich Muller, disappeared after the war. Dr Gerhard Klopfer, arrested 1945 for war crimes, discharged for lack of evidence,died 1987. Dr Krtzinger, arrested 1945,declarated ashamed of Nazi atrocities released 1947. Otto Hoffman arrested 1945,sentenced to 25 years. Dr Alfred Meyer committed suicide in the Spring of 1945.Dr Stuckard sentenced 1949 to time served. Martin Luther sent to concentration camp,died of heart attack 1945. Dr Buhler arrested 1945,executed 1948,Poland. SS colonel Schongarth executed 1946. And Colonel Adolf Eichmann captured in Argentina by Israeli agents 1960,tried, convicted and hanged for crimes against humanity,Jerusalem,May 31,1962

In January 1942, General Heydrich chaired a meeting of Hitler's top men from various Nazi bodies including the Party, the SS etc. The reason was to `discuss the inevitable and try to bring it about in the most practical way under one command'. The `inevitable' being the spiralling problem of the huge numbers of Jews and how best to deal with them.

This is a chilling dramatisation of the meeting that sealed the fate of millions of Jews. The story is quite simple and could be easily put on the stage - it is merely a board meeting with the focus being on the characters of those involved. The film plays as a normal board meeting - no one in the room is portrayed as monsters - in fact Heydrich is almost comic. One of the most chilling elements is that no-one in the room believes the Jews were normal people, some are horrified by the thought of killing them all on production lines but even then their alternatives never approach humane options.

This very wordy production would never have succeeded without strong actors and here it is blessed by not only famous faces but unknowns giving great performances. It is difficult at first to accept English actors playing Nazis but you soon get past it. Tucci and Branagh are both excellent and Colin Firth is the best I've seen him as Dr Stuckart from the Interior Ministry. I could literally name the whole cast as the members of the meeting are all well played.

This is not presented as a terrible moment and the men are not portrayed as Indiana Jones style evil Nazis. The facts are allowed to speak for themselves and it's all the more chilling for it. Overall this is an excellent film that benefits from great acting, a great script and great direction.

Our perception of the Holocaust is shaped by the harrowing images of the gas chambers and crematoria of Auswitz; watch Conspiracy and be jarred out of the complacency that comes from familiarity and be a fly-on-the-wall at the genesis of genocide.

The film documents a meeting held during WW2, when SS second-in-command, Reinhard Heydrich, assembles a group of Nazi bureaucrats and functionaries to 'discuss the final solution of the Jewish question'. In the sublime surroundings of a German country house, the assembled mingle for drinks, enjoy a first class buffet lunch and debate whether execution or sterilisation is the most efficient option of eliminating an entire race of people.

Subject matter aside, Conspiracy is all the more devastating, and precious, from its excellent script and incredible ensemble performances. There is no attempt or need to manipulate the viewer - the enormity of the truth is compelling, and appalling enough. The are no cartoon Nazis here, the depiction of Heydrich is fascinating and complex: the man is urbane, witty, impeccably mannered and utterly devoid of morality.

Credit must be given to Kenneth Branagh who propels the entire piece with one of the best portrayals on screen in memory. He is utterly convincing in the role of a man who epitomises the classic definition of evil: not just the doing of wrong, but the perversion of the human spirit so that it no longer has any perception of the good.

Where Heydrich is conviction, as the narrative develops, almost exclusively as table-talk, others are less sure. The range of attendees symbolises the various strains of Nazi culture, which developed over the course of the third reich. For the idealistic of these - the philosopher/technocrat Kritzinger; the legalistic Wilhelm Stuckart and the young soldier Major Lange, there is the dawning realisation of the human catastrophe in which they are complicit.

Technical objections are raised - Stuckhart expounds a ludicrous web of of objections on how the plan breaks the vile race laws he himself architected, and will be an 'administrative nightmare', but they soon realise this is a done deal - most of the mechanisms are already in place. The politically sharp Heydrich only needs to extract expressions of support in order to bind all the orders of Nazi society into equal guilt. During breaks in the proceedings he discreetly buttonholes the wobblers and silences their doubts: by naked threats, or in the case of Lange by invoking the fantasy that what they do is all part of a plan for a better tomorrow. Succumbing to Heydrich's magnetism and realising the dream is pretty much all that is left, Lange allows himself to be persuaded.

The eloquent script captures the delusional, the grotesque and the desparate qualities of the German position at that moment in the war: the calculation that defeat is inevitable, but unthinkable - despite the repeated whimsy of Heydrich that he will return here for a quiet country life once the war is over. He knows that he, and all others present, is headed only into the dark. And it's a one-way journey.

The other reviewer her could not be more wrong, and shows a lack of historical knowledge. Heydrich WAS rushing to get through the meeting -- that was why it only lasted 90 minutes! The meeting was not held to plot the Holocost, but rather was a staged production organized by the SS (who already had started planning the final solution and embarked on mass murder at smaller scales 7 months earlier)to obtain administrative and cooperative buy-in from the other facets of the German government, and their recognition of the SS's total authority over carrying it out. And Heydrich was alternatively charming and then abrupt and short: he was head of the Gestapo, after all. Although Branagh is much smaller and better looking than Heydrich was, he does what an actor does -- capture the essence of a presence, the gist of the personality. Likewise, Tucci embodies the "banality of evil" -- a schedule obsessed numbers & detail man, an accountant concerned only with pleasing his superiors and making mass murder efficient, while dissociating himself from the meaning and consequences of his actions.

Although not as well-acted, the German language Wansee Conference is actually a bit better in imparting the agenda-driven business meeting quality of the event. Anyone who has ever been to a business planning meeting (in any business, but especially in government or regulated utility during budget planning time) cannot help but feel sick at the ordinary familiarity of it all. Replace killing people with making and marketing widgets, and you got it.