Le juif Suss

All past comments about this notorious film have been proved correct: it IS rancid, fetid, despicable. The reasons why this film was made are equally above-board: Nazi Germany's number one goal was to descredit Jews the world over by propanganda so vile as to make the average person denounce Jews as vermin to be exterminated. It is said that when _Jud Suess_ was shown, crowds of people would set themselves wildly on Jews in the streets. That Veit Harlan, who as an actor and artist always showed a certain elegance, should have anything to do with this film (and as the director he had quite a lot to do with it), is amazing. One cannot forget that being assigned films had more to do with commands than with choice; nevertheless, he should have been leery of the project that was said to vie with _Der Ewige Jude_ as the start of the campaign of racial genocide.

A final tip when viewing _Jud Suess_: Pay close attention to Ferdinand Marian's diabolical portrayal of Suess Oppenheimer. In mannerisms, the easy refinity, the worldliness, the dropping of a bon mot, the wily insouciance of the "Jew" of yesteryears' imagination; it is all caught on celluloid Agfa film. Ferdinand Marian later committed suicide, said to be because of his remorse about his "greatest" acting role.

"Jud Süß" is overall a well-made, sometimes brilliant, occasionally hammy, movie. It's plausible that it served its intended function, to promote antisemitism, beautifully in its time. The movie came out in 1940, about one year after the beginning of the war, about five years after the Nuremberg race laws, and about two years before the Wannsee Conference. Considering the enormous, fanatical hatred of the Nazis against jews, the movie's antisemitism comes across as surprisingly subtle. Flanked by the occasional antisemitic outburst ("There are no hostels for jews in Stuttgart") the movie builds a convincing psychogram of a perpetrator and leaves all its great performances to its antiheroes, while the good guys come across as pale, square and boring.

The movie is surprising in many aspects and allows perplexing insights into the Nazi mindframe. The faulty emperor (played by Heinrich George) is described as fat, vain and sybaritic (in his fantasy uniform he's the spitting image of Goering) and also as a militarist and a megalomaniac, who has lost contact with the needs of his people (Hitler comes to mind). When Süss is eventually hanged, he comes across not so much as a monster but as the scapegoat that Wilhelm Hauff, the author of the original novella, described him as.

This baroque melodrama is the perfect Halloween flick. To watch Jud Suss is to enter an alternative universe in which Hitler had invaded Russia 6 weeks earlier, won the war, and we were all watching a different type of movie. The level of political incorrectness is horrifying. The film was the top grossing film in Germany in 1940 during a period when Germany actually had a popular film industry. It is one of about 30 films (Vorbehaltsfilme) you could be arrested in Germany for possessing. (So far it has not shown up on popular film file sharing networks). Academics may view these Vorbehaltsfilmes in private viewing sessions and film festivals. Others are subjected to home invasions by the police. The final word regarding the film would have to be the chapter Eric Rentschler devotes to it in his masterpiece, The Ministry of Illusion. There is no official list of proscribed titles (Vorbehaltsfilme)because as Rentschler puts it, "Such a list would only demonstrate that the German government considers the populace of its democracy in crucial ways politically immature" (p. 221)Many of the movies Rentschler devotes chapters to are hard to find.

This film can be viewed from several different angles, and it indeed is. First of all, it's by no means a bad film, meaning - it's very aptly directed, and the narrative runs smoothly. Some of the leading actors are very good, especially Ferdinand Marian, who doesn't stoop to anything banal and draws us a fascinating portrait of a man you can both hate and love. Then there are the shots where German people have had enough of his cunning mastermind, and take justice in their own hands. Of course, when one is immersed in the film, you would do the same. Which means, the film works as it is meant. But then - one is always allowed to ask oneself whether it was impossible for this kind of thing to happen in 1730s Germany. I think it wasn't. I think we can watch this film, and hate the bad guy, without automatically deciding to hate every Jew in the world. After all, there are hundreds of films produced in Hollywood, where the bad guy is Russian or who ever. I do think we as human race are sufficiently grown to leave our emotions in the cinema auditorium and not be influenced by something that we know is not right.

OK folks, "The Jolson Story" it certainly ain't but as propaganda films go, this one is not that bad. 60 years down the road, there can be no justification for putting this film on the banned list anymore. The film had a message to give to the German people of 1940 and was successful in that respect, but surely we have all moved on now. The final scene in "Jud Suss" should have todays audiences in fits of laughter. I am surprised that Mel Brooks hasn't done a remake of Jud Suss. Find a copy if you can and that isn't too difficult despite attempts to prevent the film being issued,and sit down with a nice box of chocolates a stiff gin and tonic and enjoy. Jud Suss certainly beats walking in the rain after all!