Downfall: Hitler and the End of the Third Reich is a very difficult but important film. The plot of the movie has Traudl Junge [Alexandra Maria Lara], the final stenographer for Adolf Hitler [Bruno Ganz], telling the story of the Nazi dictator's final days in his Berlin bunker at the end of WWII. Downfall has been nominated for Academy Award for Best Foreign Film.
Oliver Hirschbiegel is the brilliant director of Downfall who first made an impression on US soil with the psychological horror film Das Experiment which was partially based on the Stanford Prison Experiment. Before making that feature he created Kommissar Rex and directed dozens of television movies. With Downfall he tackles another very high pressure situation which has become his trademark.
Please thank Sean Suicide for having the guts and gumption to allow an interview for a movie that tackles such a difficult topic.
Go to the website for Downfall: Hitler and the End of the Third Reich
Daniel Robert Epstein: After reading a bit about you I found that you and your work are very popular overseas. Even with that did you have trouble getting financing for Downfall?
Oliver Hirschbiegel: Not really. From the moment I decided to do the film it was rather easy. I have a lot of TV experience and Das Experiment was very successful so people knew what I was worth.
DRE: Did that surprise you or were you just concentrating on making the film?
OH: After you work for a while you find out how much you are worth. Thats the rule of the game as a director and an artist. You are multimillion dollar flagship so you are responsible for making money back for the investors. Being a market value is part of the game.
DRE: Are you Jewish?
OH: No I am not. My ancestors used to be Jewish but I dont have a Jewish mother.
DRE: I ask that because it seems like many of the people who are most fascinated by Nazis are Jewish and of course if you go into any Jewish themed museum there is always a display of Nazi memorabilia. What is it you wanted to say about Adolf Hitler with this film?
OH: Even as a young boy, of 10 or 11, I read about this. I saw all these books with horrible pictures and to me it was just incomprehensible that it could have happened. I came up with questions that I never got answers too. Of course we had a lot of lessons in school about this time period but it was more in a lecturing way. The teachers explained what happened but never went into why it happened. How loving fathers turned into vicious monsters killing innocent children and civilians without feeling any pity. They were German and so am I, of course, so the blood of these people is still flowing through my veins.
When [producer/writer] Bernd [Eichinger] approached me with the idea for this film and I read the books by Joachim Fest and Traudl Junge, I saw the chance to use this new approach to look behind the backgrounds to find some answers or at least raise the questions.
DRE: In a way its dangerous to call Hitler a monster or the Antichrist because supposedly Antichrists dont come around very often. People like Hitler are probably born everyday.
OH: Thats the horrible truth and I think its a terrible mistake to say thats hes like a creature from hell. He was not an insane mad psychopath. We know that in all times he was completely aware of what he was doing and very intelligent in that way. I think its an insult to all the victims to reduce him to this cardboard figure which makes him a myth. That must not happen.
DRE: To go from a dark film like Das Experiment to Downfall must have been tough.
OH: I did not exactly choose these subjects. I am a director who does not write so I rely on what people offer me and then I read the scripts. I hope that my next film might be a romantic comedy or maybe just a straight forward action thriller.
DRE: What was working on the Downfall film set like?
OH: Bruno stays very much in character. All the actors were very well prepared because I had given them a lot of books to read and documentaries to watch. We all were dealing with basically the same unpleasant material. The laughter frequency on a film set is usually high no matter what the material but on this film it was very low. There was just not much to laugh about. It was a very straightforward and serious step by step process.
DRE: I read that Wim Wenders wrote a diatribe for the weekly paper Die Zeit against the film. It seems odd for a filmmaker like him to do that.
OH: I thought it was odd as well. To be honest I never had a chance to talk to him and hear his point. Whats wrong with making it clear that these people were human and that the true monstrosity is in the fact that Adolf Hitler was not brought to the German people by witchcraft but was actually elected. I could not see what would be wrong with depicting this.
DRE: The film is coming out almost exactly 60 years after Hitlers death. It seems like a weird coincidence.
OH: Sometimes in history these things happen. It was a historic necessity to do this now because since its been 60 years and the people who were there are dying. If we want to find out about our history we have to talk to them now.
DRE: Who do you relate to in the movie?
OH: No one really. You must not forget that all the people in the movie are perpetrators and are bad. If you will, Traudl Junge is someone who you could connect with and the same with Professor Dr. Schenck. Schenck wears a uniform but he was basically a doctor doing research. Some people dont get that he was not a SS doctor. He just had to wear the SS uniform because everyone in his position had to. He tries to do something good and its recorded that he and Professor Dr. Haase saved hundreds of lives. But overall the whole conception of National Socialism stands so much for what I hate and detest, so personally I cant connect.
DRE: Was that difficult?
OH: Everyday, because as a director you cannot just pretend. Think about someone like Hannibal Lecter. To tell this character right you have to get into his mind but Hannibal Lecter is peanuts compared to what we were dealing with there. They are just pure evil. There is nothing to relate to but still you have to reach deep down inside you and find these dark evil spots within your own soul.
DRE: I read you are married with two young children. Im sure your wife realizes that this is your art but did she ever say Does it have to be Hitler?
OH: She didnt like the idea at all and she tried to convince me not to do it. It took me a couple of weeks to decide to do it and now she sees that it was the right decision. I think that historically it was important that this film be done by Germans and not by the British, the French or Americans. Though Hitler was Austrian he spoke German and it was very important to have him speak German.
DRE: Downfall is an excellent film. What would you have done if it didnt come out as good as it did?
OH: [laughs] Luckily that did not happen. Whenever you do a film you are always afraid that it might not turn out the way you wanted it to. Ive been lucky so far because Ive always achieved what I set out to do. Youre never completely satisfied so if I am ever completely satisfied I would probably stop doing my job. You want to find out more and more about the craft to become better at it. Its a never ending challenge.
DRE: I read that you always pictured Bruno as Hitler. What did you see that made you think that?
OH: To me he is the best living actor in the German language. Ive admired him for years. He also looks like Adolf Hitler. I actually picked up a black and white photo of Bruno and drew on the moustache and the haircut and it was shocking how alike they looked. Bruno was shocked as well when he saw himself on tape all dressed up. Within two hours of seeing himself he gave me a yes.
DRE: I read there is an audio recording of Hitler after a dinner party which helped Bruno get into the character. What is that?
OH: It was done by a Finnish radio technician in 1942 who secretly hid a microphone, recorded the incident and just kept it. Hitler had a meeting there and was just talking about the war in France, the mistakes they had made and general aspects of life. Its the only document we have where you hear Hitler just talking. Its now in the archives and anyone can hear it.
DRE: It must be very scary.
OH: It is. Bruno and I had to listen to this tape a lot. I would drive around in my car listening to the voice of Adolf Hitler which is very unsettling.
DRE: The film is 150 minutes long, was there ever any suggestion to make it shorter?
OH: There is a longer version which we will put on television as a two part miniseries. But what you see on screen right now is the maximum of what an audience can take. There is nothing I could really take out.
DRE: Both Das Experiment and Downfall seem very similar in tone. What makes a Hirschbiegel film?
OH: Whatever genre I take on I strive to stay honest with my characters and the audience so I dont want to trick them. Of course its a manipulative job being a director but I try to avoid clichs which I think the audience appreciates. By following that concept you enhance intensity so the more you make people forget that they are watching someone pretending to be someone else the more you get to them. Thats what I always try to do.
DRE: Are you being offered any American films now?
OH: Thats basically what I am being offered, American or English scripts. Nothing I am going to move forward with. Its tough to find something that would be right. I need to read a lot of scripts to see what I would like to do.
DRE: How come you dont write?
OH: I did write a bit. I did a rewrite on a pretty good script and I did a great deal of writing on Das Experiment. Im good at collaborating with a writer but Im not a good inventor of stories. I found that Im a much better director than writer so I try to work with good writers.
DRE: Where did you grow up?
OH: Hamburg.
DRE: How did you first get into watching films?
OH: We never had television at home because I was at the Waldorf School which is a Rudolf Steiner School so television was forbidden. I turned 12 before I sat in front of a television and watched a movie. I must say I was hooked pretty fast and from then on I tried to see as many movies as possible. I still never had it in mind to be a filmmaker myself though. I was painting, drawing, performing and doing installations for ten years until I got in touch with filmmaking. After I did my first TV movie I knew that becoming a filmmaker was my destiny.
DRE: Your English is very good, when did you start learning that?
OH: At the Waldorf School, English is the first language you learn after your mother language. Then I had a lot of American girlfriends which are the best [laughs]. They make you talk because they have questions all the time.
DRE: [laughs] You mean American women or women in general?
OH: Women in general, I think, is fair to say.
DRE: Have you been to New York City before?
OH: Yes many times. My best friend is here so Ive spent months and months here at a time.
DRE: What makes you laugh?
OH: Jerry Lewis makes me laugh. Thats the first thing that came into my head.
DRE: What kind of humorous movie would you like to make?
OH: My biggest hero in filmmaking is Howard Hawks and the screwball comedies he and others made are my favorite kind of comedies. They are hilarious and they also deal with their characters seriously and honestly. That is something I would like to do.
The kind of film I am interested in the least are these action films that are half shot in front of a bluescreen.
DRE: Do you know of SuicideGirls?
OH: Ive heard of it.
DRE: Its naked punk girls basically.
OH: That sounds interesting Ill have check it out.
DRE: Do you have any tattoos?
OH: Not a single one. I kept thinking about getting one for years but then in the 80s everyone had one.
DRE: What would you have gotten?
OH: I would have gotten an anchor or an upside down dolphin on my arm.
DRE: Are you excited about the possibility of winning an Academy Award?
OH: I think every filmmaker dreams of an Oscar but for a foreign director its nearly unreachable because we dont even speak the language. To be nominated means you have already won. But to actually win the award would be amazing and wonderful for my country.
Im going to the Award show and I will meet all the other directors. Its going to be a great competition.
DRE: Who are you most excited to meet?
OH: Alejandro Amenbar. Even though hes very young I think he is a master of his craft. The Sea Inside is a very strong movie and if the award goes to Amenbar then I am fine [laughs].
by Daniel Robert Epstein
SG Username: AndersWolleck
Oliver Hirschbiegel is the brilliant director of Downfall who first made an impression on US soil with the psychological horror film Das Experiment which was partially based on the Stanford Prison Experiment. Before making that feature he created Kommissar Rex and directed dozens of television movies. With Downfall he tackles another very high pressure situation which has become his trademark.
Please thank Sean Suicide for having the guts and gumption to allow an interview for a movie that tackles such a difficult topic.
Go to the website for Downfall: Hitler and the End of the Third Reich
Daniel Robert Epstein: After reading a bit about you I found that you and your work are very popular overseas. Even with that did you have trouble getting financing for Downfall?
Oliver Hirschbiegel: Not really. From the moment I decided to do the film it was rather easy. I have a lot of TV experience and Das Experiment was very successful so people knew what I was worth.
DRE: Did that surprise you or were you just concentrating on making the film?
OH: After you work for a while you find out how much you are worth. Thats the rule of the game as a director and an artist. You are multimillion dollar flagship so you are responsible for making money back for the investors. Being a market value is part of the game.
DRE: Are you Jewish?
OH: No I am not. My ancestors used to be Jewish but I dont have a Jewish mother.
DRE: I ask that because it seems like many of the people who are most fascinated by Nazis are Jewish and of course if you go into any Jewish themed museum there is always a display of Nazi memorabilia. What is it you wanted to say about Adolf Hitler with this film?
OH: Even as a young boy, of 10 or 11, I read about this. I saw all these books with horrible pictures and to me it was just incomprehensible that it could have happened. I came up with questions that I never got answers too. Of course we had a lot of lessons in school about this time period but it was more in a lecturing way. The teachers explained what happened but never went into why it happened. How loving fathers turned into vicious monsters killing innocent children and civilians without feeling any pity. They were German and so am I, of course, so the blood of these people is still flowing through my veins.
When [producer/writer] Bernd [Eichinger] approached me with the idea for this film and I read the books by Joachim Fest and Traudl Junge, I saw the chance to use this new approach to look behind the backgrounds to find some answers or at least raise the questions.
DRE: In a way its dangerous to call Hitler a monster or the Antichrist because supposedly Antichrists dont come around very often. People like Hitler are probably born everyday.
OH: Thats the horrible truth and I think its a terrible mistake to say thats hes like a creature from hell. He was not an insane mad psychopath. We know that in all times he was completely aware of what he was doing and very intelligent in that way. I think its an insult to all the victims to reduce him to this cardboard figure which makes him a myth. That must not happen.
DRE: To go from a dark film like Das Experiment to Downfall must have been tough.
OH: I did not exactly choose these subjects. I am a director who does not write so I rely on what people offer me and then I read the scripts. I hope that my next film might be a romantic comedy or maybe just a straight forward action thriller.
DRE: What was working on the Downfall film set like?
OH: Bruno stays very much in character. All the actors were very well prepared because I had given them a lot of books to read and documentaries to watch. We all were dealing with basically the same unpleasant material. The laughter frequency on a film set is usually high no matter what the material but on this film it was very low. There was just not much to laugh about. It was a very straightforward and serious step by step process.
DRE: I read that Wim Wenders wrote a diatribe for the weekly paper Die Zeit against the film. It seems odd for a filmmaker like him to do that.
OH: I thought it was odd as well. To be honest I never had a chance to talk to him and hear his point. Whats wrong with making it clear that these people were human and that the true monstrosity is in the fact that Adolf Hitler was not brought to the German people by witchcraft but was actually elected. I could not see what would be wrong with depicting this.
DRE: The film is coming out almost exactly 60 years after Hitlers death. It seems like a weird coincidence.
OH: Sometimes in history these things happen. It was a historic necessity to do this now because since its been 60 years and the people who were there are dying. If we want to find out about our history we have to talk to them now.
DRE: Who do you relate to in the movie?
OH: No one really. You must not forget that all the people in the movie are perpetrators and are bad. If you will, Traudl Junge is someone who you could connect with and the same with Professor Dr. Schenck. Schenck wears a uniform but he was basically a doctor doing research. Some people dont get that he was not a SS doctor. He just had to wear the SS uniform because everyone in his position had to. He tries to do something good and its recorded that he and Professor Dr. Haase saved hundreds of lives. But overall the whole conception of National Socialism stands so much for what I hate and detest, so personally I cant connect.
DRE: Was that difficult?
OH: Everyday, because as a director you cannot just pretend. Think about someone like Hannibal Lecter. To tell this character right you have to get into his mind but Hannibal Lecter is peanuts compared to what we were dealing with there. They are just pure evil. There is nothing to relate to but still you have to reach deep down inside you and find these dark evil spots within your own soul.
DRE: I read you are married with two young children. Im sure your wife realizes that this is your art but did she ever say Does it have to be Hitler?
OH: She didnt like the idea at all and she tried to convince me not to do it. It took me a couple of weeks to decide to do it and now she sees that it was the right decision. I think that historically it was important that this film be done by Germans and not by the British, the French or Americans. Though Hitler was Austrian he spoke German and it was very important to have him speak German.
DRE: Downfall is an excellent film. What would you have done if it didnt come out as good as it did?
OH: [laughs] Luckily that did not happen. Whenever you do a film you are always afraid that it might not turn out the way you wanted it to. Ive been lucky so far because Ive always achieved what I set out to do. Youre never completely satisfied so if I am ever completely satisfied I would probably stop doing my job. You want to find out more and more about the craft to become better at it. Its a never ending challenge.
DRE: I read that you always pictured Bruno as Hitler. What did you see that made you think that?
OH: To me he is the best living actor in the German language. Ive admired him for years. He also looks like Adolf Hitler. I actually picked up a black and white photo of Bruno and drew on the moustache and the haircut and it was shocking how alike they looked. Bruno was shocked as well when he saw himself on tape all dressed up. Within two hours of seeing himself he gave me a yes.
DRE: I read there is an audio recording of Hitler after a dinner party which helped Bruno get into the character. What is that?
OH: It was done by a Finnish radio technician in 1942 who secretly hid a microphone, recorded the incident and just kept it. Hitler had a meeting there and was just talking about the war in France, the mistakes they had made and general aspects of life. Its the only document we have where you hear Hitler just talking. Its now in the archives and anyone can hear it.
DRE: It must be very scary.
OH: It is. Bruno and I had to listen to this tape a lot. I would drive around in my car listening to the voice of Adolf Hitler which is very unsettling.
DRE: The film is 150 minutes long, was there ever any suggestion to make it shorter?
OH: There is a longer version which we will put on television as a two part miniseries. But what you see on screen right now is the maximum of what an audience can take. There is nothing I could really take out.
DRE: Both Das Experiment and Downfall seem very similar in tone. What makes a Hirschbiegel film?
OH: Whatever genre I take on I strive to stay honest with my characters and the audience so I dont want to trick them. Of course its a manipulative job being a director but I try to avoid clichs which I think the audience appreciates. By following that concept you enhance intensity so the more you make people forget that they are watching someone pretending to be someone else the more you get to them. Thats what I always try to do.
DRE: Are you being offered any American films now?
OH: Thats basically what I am being offered, American or English scripts. Nothing I am going to move forward with. Its tough to find something that would be right. I need to read a lot of scripts to see what I would like to do.
DRE: How come you dont write?
OH: I did write a bit. I did a rewrite on a pretty good script and I did a great deal of writing on Das Experiment. Im good at collaborating with a writer but Im not a good inventor of stories. I found that Im a much better director than writer so I try to work with good writers.
DRE: Where did you grow up?
OH: Hamburg.
DRE: How did you first get into watching films?
OH: We never had television at home because I was at the Waldorf School which is a Rudolf Steiner School so television was forbidden. I turned 12 before I sat in front of a television and watched a movie. I must say I was hooked pretty fast and from then on I tried to see as many movies as possible. I still never had it in mind to be a filmmaker myself though. I was painting, drawing, performing and doing installations for ten years until I got in touch with filmmaking. After I did my first TV movie I knew that becoming a filmmaker was my destiny.
DRE: Your English is very good, when did you start learning that?
OH: At the Waldorf School, English is the first language you learn after your mother language. Then I had a lot of American girlfriends which are the best [laughs]. They make you talk because they have questions all the time.
DRE: [laughs] You mean American women or women in general?
OH: Women in general, I think, is fair to say.
DRE: Have you been to New York City before?
OH: Yes many times. My best friend is here so Ive spent months and months here at a time.
DRE: What makes you laugh?
OH: Jerry Lewis makes me laugh. Thats the first thing that came into my head.
DRE: What kind of humorous movie would you like to make?
OH: My biggest hero in filmmaking is Howard Hawks and the screwball comedies he and others made are my favorite kind of comedies. They are hilarious and they also deal with their characters seriously and honestly. That is something I would like to do.
The kind of film I am interested in the least are these action films that are half shot in front of a bluescreen.
DRE: Do you know of SuicideGirls?
OH: Ive heard of it.
DRE: Its naked punk girls basically.
OH: That sounds interesting Ill have check it out.
DRE: Do you have any tattoos?
OH: Not a single one. I kept thinking about getting one for years but then in the 80s everyone had one.
DRE: What would you have gotten?
OH: I would have gotten an anchor or an upside down dolphin on my arm.
DRE: Are you excited about the possibility of winning an Academy Award?
OH: I think every filmmaker dreams of an Oscar but for a foreign director its nearly unreachable because we dont even speak the language. To be nominated means you have already won. But to actually win the award would be amazing and wonderful for my country.
Im going to the Award show and I will meet all the other directors. Its going to be a great competition.
DRE: Who are you most excited to meet?
OH: Alejandro Amenbar. Even though hes very young I think he is a master of his craft. The Sea Inside is a very strong movie and if the award goes to Amenbar then I am fine [laughs].
by Daniel Robert Epstein
SG Username: AndersWolleck
VIEW 7 of 7 COMMENTS
As not Hollywood as you can get.
I found this Hitler too wretched and humane in this movie. In the end it is an unbelievable belittlement of the historic figure Hitler. I don't want to say that Bruno (Ganz) did a bad job playing Hitler, quite the contrary, he did a very good job, as i don't want to reduce to achievement of (Bernd) Eichinger anyway. It is an insane job they accomplished. But however I saw to much of Bruno Ganz, in the end his Hitler became a figure for which i felt pity. I don't know if pity is something to confront the historical figure Hitlers.
I left the movie and thought that now, more than ever, work on mourning for Hitler needs to be done in germany. He can't have been such an old, harmless halfwit. In this movie, so many good germans appeared that i felt dizzy,
I am not very good at translating. so msg me if something does not makes sense.
quickie
btw: some weird movie trivia: Bruno Ganz was considered for the role of Oskar Schindler in Schindlers List (source IMDB). Feels strange now, doesn't it?
[Edited on Mar 10, 2005 by quickietwo]
[Edited on Mar 12, 2005 by quickietwo]