Those “Downfall” videos
Here’s a meta one:
A comment I saw from an article about Downfall spoofs as a whole has this to say about why they are so funny:
Taking two polar opposites and joining them seamlessly is a standard source of humour. Hitler represents the very depths of human depravity, but when joined with utter triviality like the lack of features on the iPhone or a lukewarm response from the local WI, and the conjunction is always likely to be very funny.
More from the article:
It is not an obvious subject for humour. Yet for millions of internet users there is something hilarious about this scene being turned on its head.
There is no clear explanation why this category of parody should have proved such a hardy internet meme, says technology writer Bill Thompson.
“It was just lucky. There is no particular reason why Downfall should have taken off.”
I think there is a reason. Taking one of the deepest, darkest, most obscenely evil chapters in human history and making it into something to ridicule is not just funny in and of itself, as the commenter says, although it is that. The humor that ensues is also a release of tension, a relief, a letting off of an enormous amount of steam, fear, and loathing for an especially loathsome creature. There is something wild and transgressive about it.
Hitler killed himself and had his body burned so that no one could desecrate it; he knew what had happened to his ally Mussolini. These videos represent one of the few ways to do something that is a tiny, tiny bit of a metaphorical equivalent, the power to make Hitler in all his raging vileness a figure of ludicrousness. And yes, we know it’s not really Hitler at all, it’s an actor playing him, albeit playing him very well.
Of course we can’t rewrite history and improve it, much as we might like to. Hitler came to power, he killed millions and was responsible for the death of many millions more and for untold suffering. We cannot bring them back to life or undo that suffering. Furthermore, by killing himself he evaded whatever earthly justice the world might have meted out to him in addition to the defeat that is the actual subject matter of the original “Downfall” scene. What can people do now with all of this? Well, one thing they can do is to make him a figure of mockery that billions can summon up at the click of a mouse.
[NOTE: Here’s the Telegraph’s 25 most recommended “Downfall” videos.]
Good analysis. Thanks.
Whatever name or tag you chose to call this human monster it can not fit him with what he done to millions of innocents under his control or run after to kill them.
But do we learn some thing from that disaster of humanity?
This is the question of today we still have “millions killed, millions we are responsible for their death of many millions more and for untold suffering. We cannot bring them back to life but we may able to undo that suffering.”
Nice item. Very nice.
Virginia Heffernan had a very different take on the videos:
They missed this one:
Hitler reacts to Gibson’s 29% Price increase:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cB0wi5-5wNU
“the power to make Hitler in all his raging vileness a figure of ludicrousness.”
Like Chaplin did with the “Great Dictator”. Strangely enough he, nor anyone else, gave the same treatment to “Uncle Joe” or Lenin, Trotski, …
I have to say I rather like (some of) the downfall parodies. But they tend to reduce “evil” to Hitler and reducing everything to Hitler has been done more than enough. The pit we are in today isn’t the result of Hitler or Hitler’s heirs but of marxism and its practitioners.
Ernst Lubitsch’s “To Be or Not to Be” is another. Release before America entered WWII, it ridicules Hitler while recognizing his capacity for evil.
It’s more like Godwin on steroids. It’s using Hitler to apply to today’s figures.
I’m not sure it’s much about Hitler so much as the performance of going on a rage while having people obey you in fear.
Godwin was talking about losing arguments in debate, but the way these videos are done is using rhetoric to convince, it’s not a cheap debate trick that can lose.
Part of the reason why I find Mel Brooks’ “The Producers” such a great film. The film works on its own; its a good story, you care about the characters, and it’s extraordinarily funny, but it also makes a complete and utter mockery of Hitler, the Nazis, the German people, German culture, Germn language…
It’s more damaging to Hitler and the legacy of the Nazis that their movement be a laughingstock, than a pwerful regime that is to be feared. It’s a wonderful testament to Mr. Brooks’ talent that he so successfully made a ridicule of Hitler. It is an example of the pen being mightier than the sword regarding historical perspective.