Intended as a propaganda movie , the audience did not react to it as Goebbels expected ;in fact taken in isolation of its historical context -that made it an accursed movie- succeeds measurably well ;it should be pointed out that,in Nurnberg ,the movie was considered " a "not quite nazi propaganda " film.
A person who would not know the film was released in 1941 could easily be fooled and Liebeneiner 's movie looked upon as an intimate tragedy ,what the film actually was: the German audience was deeply upset by Hanna 's and Pr Heyt's terrible fate; a professor with good prospects and his wife ,proud of his husband, who has just be appointed to an important post in Munchen ;thus the first twenty minutes are essentially a celebration ,the wife believing she's pregnant to boot.
The medical exams and the wife's despair are treated with a great modesty ; the illness (multiple sclerosis) and the desperate research of a distraught husband are shown in parallel ;it should not be lost on anybody that there was a woman among the scientists whereas they were at best nurses at the time ; it's the female researcher who puts an end to a lab mouse's sufferings .Heidemarie Heyer is a strong actress,playing a terminally-ill woman ,hoping against hope ; matching her all along the way is Paul Hartmann's researcher ,facing the worst dilemma ;his final speech is impressive in his "judge not lest you be judged " ; the ending is daring for the time (and the historical context :one should note that there're no real hints at the political situation of the -then- triumphant country )
It must be the subject: in 2013, a terminally -ill girl in her twenties was compelled to leave her homeland for Switzerland to get assisted suicide: "und Morgens bin ich tod" ;that was then ,but this is now.
