Holocaust: Night will fall. I'm a sucker for WW2 documentaries, particularly relating to the Holocaust, Nazi concentration camps etc. Slightly morbid obsession really but fascinating to me all the same. http://www.channel4.com/programmes/holocaust-night-will-fall/on-demand/57245-001 It focusses around imagery and video captured by the Allied forces, as camps were liberated. Lots of footage that has never been seen before, shocking isn't the word, it's morbid and it's almost unbelievable. The Brits really did a fantastic job of 'capturing the moment', but you can see from those still alive, it has tormented them through their entire lives, what they found inside those fences. Many people still argue that the holocaust didn't happen to this day, it's beyond belief.
It's a good documentary. That Relief of Belsen is good as well. I imagine it was awful for the allied soldiers to keep them in the camps so they could monitor their food, medicine intake. I suppose it was for their benefit in the end.
Yeah I remember our private guide telling us that many of the prisoners who were saved at Birkenau were getting sick trying to eat too much food after they'd been rescued. Many of the prisoners were riddled with contagious infections and diseases and trying to touch the soldiers who rescued them, to show gratitude.
Yeah. Some married the soldiers didn't they? Unfortunately, some of the SS Men got away with it & lived out their lives without coming to justice. The film, that was on recently, about the Eichmann trial in Jerusalem was well made as well. I'd like to go, because i'm a massive hostory buff and all. I've only been to Sachsenhausen, near Berlin. It's not the the scale of Belsen or Auschwitz but it's a massive eye opener. Unfortunately, Neo Nazis got in once and defaced all the huts with Swastikas & Anti Jewish graffiti.
Went this time last year, to Auschwitz & Birkenau. One of the best things I've ever done. The guide was worth every penny, so if you're going to do it, forget about doing it in a group, the interaction was worth paying more for. He was happy to answer any questions, which you can't really do whilst wearing a headset listening to a pre-recorded tour guide. Birkenau was haunting, it didn't settle in for days afterwards what I'd seen. There was graffiti there as well, which has led to them using just certain buildings for the tour now, totally understandable. Krakow is a great city as well.
Is this the documentary which goes into Hitchcock's proposed documentary on the holocaust which wasn't finished at first? I saw that. Harrowing scenes but very very good.
Yeah, that's the one mate, I had it in my planner from last week, only got round to watching it last night.
It was shocking but the way they filmed it was fascinating to me, it felt at times like I was there, especially with the British footage. Can't believe some people say it didn't happen.
Oh it happened. No doubt about it. Hitler's hording interested me, there's something about a giant pile of reading glasses or left shoes which as just as powerful as a pile of bodies. It's weird it was some of the less graphic footage made all my hairs stand on end. But that's the power of good documentary footage.
Yeah, they've got mountains of stuff at Auschwitz mate, human hair from prisoners. They used to sell it to local mills to make bedding and blankets with, don't try telling me that mill owner didn't recognise human hair, so many people played oblivious to the whole thing when the camps were liberated. There were glasses, shoes, shaving brushes, false limbs... when you see them piled up behind the glass it hits home, the scale of the operation they were running there. The orders for Zyklon-B were huge, you don't order that stuff if you're not systematically killing people en-mass, there's no basis for denial for me.
And there's where the shame of the Germans stems from, the shame their great great grandchildren have inherited. The fact the it wasn't a dictatorship, that it was an elected democracy which had the backing of their citizens. That they accepted the treatment of these poor people and just saw them as pests to their society and that they were just byproducts once 'delt' with.
Not totally true as the Nazi party was part of a coalition government in the beginning but Hitler used world events to good effect to use as propaganda claiming the world was against Germany. It would have been a country without a government had he not become Chancellor. The average German could not care less who ran the country so long as somebody did. By the mid '30s if you were not a registered Nazi party supporter then you got no citizen privileges. His first camp was just outside Munich but it was for political prisoners to be re-educated. The Holocaust most certainly happened and was planned to do success but those who opposed Hitler also received harsh treatment.
Was hoping you'd watch it Billy, I know you've got an interest in this stuff. Glad you took the time and I hope many others do as well. Soldiers collecting footage probably aren't remembered as well as some other heroes from WW2 but this type of thing should ensure nobody ever forgets what happened.
Yes indeed. I saw some awful things in Yugo but nowhere near owt on that scale. You'd certainly never forget it that's for sure.
The best part of WW2 history now is that it is being shown rather written about. Not long ago I watched a series entitles "Hitler's Children" showing his systematic way of building the youth of Germany to become ready for war from about 1935 as they would be the next generation of soldier to replace any lost in wars. Even the girls were trained as nurses and such like. Like everyone else they had to be a member of the Nazi party and the strongest and most aggressive were singles out for military careers. It was on the history channel but is a 5 part DVD series not to be confused with another with the same title about children of high ranking Nazis.
Just staying with the control the Nazis had over all Germans this quotation from anti-nazi Padre Martin Niemoller is very apt and just shows how much control the evil . First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a Socialist. Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a Trade Unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.
When we were in Germany, for the World Cup, I made a point of taking my 2 adult sons to Courtroom 600 and http://museums.nuremberg.de/documentation-centre/topics/permanent-exhibition.html There's also an interesting personal opinion here, http://lewweinsteinauthorblog.com/2...ry-glorification-of-the-rise-of-adolf-hitler/ The exhibition is harrowing and a little frightening but I thought it would be a valuable experience fr them. At the very end of the exhibition was a brief 'explanation' that it was all the fault of a small bunch of Nazi, not actually German, madmen The 'reason' given for invading Poland was that Germany was 'desperately short of living space' We laughed about that as we drove through hundreds of miles of open countryside from one match venue to the next.
