Petra Epperlein and Michael Tucker's "The Meaning of Hitler", based on the eponymous 1978 bestselling book, examines how Hitler's legacy continues to impact us today. For many years, Hitler sat as a part of history that most everyone regarded with disdain, at least in public. Those days are over. It's becoming much more common to show support for Hitler without it being universally condemned.
The documentary goes back and forth between discussing some of the history of Adolf Hitler and tying him to the rise of antisemitism and white supremacy around the world, not surprisingly linking it to the rise of Donald Trump in American politics. It also draws comparisons between the two men in their tendency to lie incessantly.
One of the most interesting parallels drawn in the film is how both Hitler and Trump seized upon new technology to help promote their respective ideologies. Everyone knows that Trump used social media, particularly Twitter and Facebook, to help build his brand. One thing I learned here is that an advancement in the technology of the microphone greatly abetted Hitler's rise to power.
Previously, if you spoke into a microphone, your face almost had to touch it in order to be heard clearly. Improvements were made in microphone technology that allowed the speaker to stand further away and added the ability to modulate your voice back and forth between yelling and speaking softly. This mic was notoriously made use of by Hitler at Nazi Party rallies.
Much of this documentary is told through the voices of historians and writers, including Deborah Lipstadt, Martin Amis, Sir Richard Evans, Saul Friedlander, Yehuda Bauer, and Nazi hunters Beate and Serge Klarsfeld.
"The Meaning of Hitler" is sometimes fascinating and insightful. Sometimes it's a bit slow and redundant. As a whole, I have to recommend it, but the central thing I took away from it was that I want to read the book it's based upon.
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