Thehibikiew Not even bad in a good way

PlatinumRead Just so...so bad

Konterr Brilliant and touching

Keeley Coleman The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;

Myriam Nys The Nazi's produced "Jew Süss", a vile piece of anti-Semitic propaganda. After World War II, the movie was taken out of circulation : as far as I know, showing and distributing the movie is still illegal in Germany and Austria, or at least subject to draconian restrictions. (However, it's a pretty safe bet that there are neonazi's around who keep and venerate an illegal copy, next to a photograph of the Great Guide kissing a darling child with a bouquet of wild flowers.) "A film without a conscience" tells the story of how and why the "Jew Süss" movie was made. It does so by focusing on the life and times of the actor who played the title role.When "A film without a conscience" was made, there was a fair amount of controversy : people feared that it would revive interest in "Jew Süss", thus creating a new audience. I understand and respect this position. However, after having seen "Without a conscience" I think that this fear is misplaced, since "Without a conscience" slowly and carefully explains, with admirable didactic clarity, that "Jew Süss" was created as a weapon against the innocent and inoffensive. As a result it's very hard to imagine a sane and decent person watching the credits and saying : "So there's a lying piece of Nazi propaganda out there ? Quick, I want to enjoy it, share it, embrace it ! Or even better, let's watch it with the whole family, so that we can all indoctrinate ourselves. It's high time we became hate-filled fanatics".Personally I give "Without a conscience" high marks for bravery and usefulness : confronting and condemning the errors of the past is the best way of preventing their come-back.There are other things to admire about the movie, such as the intelligent dissection of the Nazi propaganda machine : the Nazi's had such a need for industrial-strength propaganda because they told such industrial-strength lies. (But then, how could it be otherwise ? The truth is such a radiantly beautiful maiden that she can afford to show herself in the nude ; the lie is an old prostitute, who needs shawls and feathers and make-up and fur coats in order to hide her sores.) "Without a conscience" also does a good job of capturing the venality and decadence of the Nazi brass : these people may have talked a lot about ancestral virtues and moral rectitude, but they were not averse to mistresses, dirty weekends and casting couches - on the contrary. Give Caligula a blonde rinse and a uniform, and he would have fitted right in.Finally there is a memorable performance by Mr. Bleibtreu. His Goebbels is deeply, deeply frightening : a coldhearted creature of whim and calculation both, born in order to deal out carrots and sticks and capable of switching from debonair benevolence to vicious threat (or back) in five seconds flat.

Horst in Translation ([email protected]) "Jud Süss - Film ohne Gewissen" is a German movie from 5 years ago written and directed by Oskar Roehler. Roehler is one of the most successful German filmmakers right now and here he adapted Friedrich Knilli's book for this controversial movie. It runs for almost 2 hours and features Tobias Moretti (Kommissar Rex) as the title character. This film will do absolutely nothing for you if you do not know already about the events that are depicted in there. You so not necessarily have to have seen the original "Jud Süß", but it helps. However, you really need to know about the film's contents and also a bit about Marian, Harlan, Goebbels... And even if this applies to me that I do know about all of this as I am particularly interested in the Nazi years and World War II, I was still disappointed by the movie. It is tough to point a finger on what exactly went wrong. It may be the script. The actors exclude many big names, at least here in Germany. I will not list the names, but you can check the cast to see them. Roehler, once again, works with 2 actors who I am a bit surprised to see in here (Bauer, Stadlober). He has a tendency of casting popular actors that do not have that much talent really. But as long as they are just in smaller roles, it's fine for me.Anyway, the premise here is excellent. It was a really interesting time for movies in Germany and, as despicable as propaganda films may be, it's still interesting to watch them and figure out how they could alter people's minds back then. It's a film about a film. But it's also a film about Ferdinand Marian's life around that time. We find out about his wife and how that relationship made things really complicated in every regard. But we also find out about his thought process and how Goebbels basically forced him to accept the role. Still, his doubts were mostly not because he despised the propaganda, but because people would see him as a Jew. Back then films were something entirely different. Audiences thought frequently actors would also personify with their characters in real life, even if that may sound absurd by today's standards. Anyway, all in all, I was pretty disappointed here. This film has not many interesting scenes really and it also drags and should have been kept a lot shorter. They certainly missed a chance here of turning a truly interesting story into an interesting film. I was particularly disappointed by Bleibtreu who offered absolutely nothing as Goebbels here apart from over-the-top face expressions and screaming. This was a disappointing work. Not recommended.

petarmatic Why was this film talked against at Berlinale? I find it excellent. It is very interesting story about what happened to actor Marian who acted in Jew Suss. We are still not sure, but I heard that some soldiers of some country who occupied Germany at that time killed him. Nobody is sure.It is very important to explore Nazi propaganda films, it was an interesting time in the history of film making in Germany at that time. I wished Nazi period never happened, but it did and left a legacy in film making that Germany and UFA should not be proud of.I would definitely recommend this film for all people who want to know about what happened to film making during Nazi period. We should explore further what happened to the actor Ferdinand Marian.

Karl Self German movies about the Nazi dictatorship are usually heavily subsidised, but nothing to write home about (which actually goes for most German movies these days). "Jud Süß -- Film ohne Gewissen" by Oscar Roehler stands out because it tries to go beyond the simplistic message that "the Nazis were evil". Instead it honestly tries to explore the fact why an actor who didn't sympathise with the Nazis nevertheless chose to play lead in Veit Harlan's antisemitic "masterpiece". We witness Ferdinand Marian getting sucked deep into the heart of darkness. Oscar Roehler also takes a good look at the sexual life of the fascist bohème, with an impressive performance by Gudrun Landgrebe, who looks unbelievably foxy despite her sixty years of age.This was also the only movie I can think of that displays survivors of the Nazi death machine not as saintly survivors but as brutalised human beings.That said, I take umbrage at four aspects of this movie:* the -- pardon my French -- overly drastic fellatio scene between Goebbels and housemaid Britta, who wears a golden swastika pendant to hammer home the fact that she's a Nazi slag (and while I'm at it, the actress playing her, Anna Unterberger, is far to blonde and svelte for a realistic housemaid)* in the movie, Ferdinand Marian's wife Anna is a "semi-Jewess" who is eventually murdered by the Nazis while Marian lives the high life of a Nazi A-list actor; in reality she wasn't Jewish (although she had previously been married to a Jew and in consequence her daughter was "half Jewish"), and survived her husband by three years; in my book, that alteration was hammy and unfair game* unlike displayed in the movie, Marian probably died in an "ordinary" traffic accident and didn't commit suicide* I didn't get the scene where Marian is in a nightclub in Prague with a transvestite; also, in that same scene we see a German soldier firing into the crowd with his Luger, a histrionic scene which would have resulted in carnage plus a court martial for the shooterYou have to view these criticisms in the light that this movie was booed at the Berlinale, ostracised by many critics, and the highest Jewish representative in Germany even called for it to be banned. Of course everyone is free to dislike and criticise this movie, but I simply don't understand what caused this massive rejection of a serious, well-made and captivating movie.PS: for reference, if you want a movie that really deals with Nazism in an inappropriate manner, check out "Der Vorleser".