Inglourious Basterds
Kristen Allen:
Tarantino's 'kosher porno' thrills Germany: Set “Once upon a time,” in occupied France, two parallel plot lines focus on Jews exacting bloodthirsty revenge for the Holocaust by assassinating Hitler at a propaganda film premiere in Paris. While a band of renegade American-Jewish soldiers led by Brad Pitt called “The Basterds” hunts and mercilessly kills Nazi soldiers behind enemy lines, an outwardly meek French Jew living under an assumed identity plots a fiery revenge for her family’s death.
The script, inspired by Italian director Enzo Castellari's 1978 movie "The Inglorious Bastards," features Tarantino’s typically witty dialogue and cartoonish violence – but German critics are most fascinated by how it challenges standard Nazi film constructs and archetypes....
[The] film is what Eli Roth, who played the most savage member of The Basterds, Boston Jew Donny Donowitz, told the LA Times is “kosher porno.” Styling Jewish characters to retaliate against their brutal oppressors is certainly daring, but German critics are loving it. “Many are asking the question: is this allowed? Can someone portray Jews as killers who also have fun with their murderous work?” German-Israeli publicist Rafael Seligmann wrote in news magazine Stern, referring to ongoing trauma to second and third-generation descendants of Holocaust victims.... The film levels the playing field for Jews and Nazis, he says, showing that the violent revenge of the helpless is “all too human.”
And after this revelation, “Pope Quentin” goes on to manifest the “biggest exorcism of all,” daily Die Welt opined. “He manages finally to send this Hitler to the devil in a way besides suicide,” the paper said. “Historic accuracy is a virtue, but fantasy brings liberation.”
But there is a real story--the assassination not of Hitler but of his potential (I say probable) successor, the number two guy of the Final Solution, Reinhard Heydrich (played by Kenneth Branagh in the movie "Conspiracy"), SS-Obergruppenführer and General der Polizei, chief of the Reich Main Security Office (including the Gestapo, SD and Kripo Nazi police agencies) and Stellvertretender Reichsprotektor (Deputy Reich-Protector) of Bohemia and Moravia:
Wikipedia:
Reinhard Heydrich: Reinhard Tristan Eugen Heydrich (March 7, 1904 – June 4, 1942).... Adolf Hitler considered him a possible successor.... Heydrich chaired the 1942 Wannsee Conference, which discussed plans for the deportation and extermination of all Jews in German-occupied territory. He was attacked by Czech assassins in Prague on 27 May 1942 and died slightly over a week later from complications arising from his injuries....
Heydrich's... suppression of all possible dissent prior to and during the 1936 Olympics, a task he executed with a cold and systematic ruthlessness that gained him the German Olympia Honor Badge (First Class) (Deutsches Olympiaehrenzeichen).... [T]he SD, and the SIPO (made up of the Gestapo and the KRIPO) were unified under one office, the Reich Main Security Office RSHA, which was placed under Heydrich's control.... On 27 September 1941 Heydrich was appointed Stellvertretender Reichsprotektor in the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia... for all intents and purposes, military dictator of Bohemia and Moravia....
Operation Anthropoid - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia: The exiled government of Czechoslovakia... felt it had to do something that would inspire the Czechs, as well as show the world the Czechs were allies. The status of Reinhard Heydrich as the Protector of Bohemia and Moravia as well as his reputation for terrorizing local citizens led to him being chosen... as an assassination target... to prove to the Nazis that they were not untouchable.
The operation was given the codename ANTHROPOID. With the British Special Operations Executive (SOE), preparation began on 20 October 1941. Warrant Officer Jozef Gabčík and Staff Sergeant Karel Svoboda were chosen to carry out the assassination on 28 October 1941 (Czechoslovakia's Independence Day). Svoboda was replaced with Jan Kubiš after a head injury during training.... Jozef Gabčík and Jan Kubiš of ANTHROPOID were airlifted... into Czechoslovakia at 2200 hours on December 28, 1941.... In Prague, they contacted several families and anti-Nazi organisations who helped them during the preparations for the assassination....
On May 27, 1942 at 10:30 AM, Heydrich proceeded on his daily commuting journey from his home in Panenské Břežany to Prague Castle. Gabčík and Kubiš waited at the tram stop in the curve near Bulovka hospital. Valčik was positioned about 100 metres north of Gabčík and Kubiš as lookout for the approaching car. As Heydrich’s open-topped Mercedes-Benz neared the pair, Gabčík stepped in front of the vehicle, trying to open fire, but his Sten gun jammed. Heydrich ordered his driver, SS-Oberscharführer Klein, to stop the car. When Heydrich stood up to try to shoot Gabčík, Kubiš threw a modified anti-tank grenade at the vehicle, and its fragments ripped through the car’s right fender, embedding shrapnel and fibres from the upholstery into Heydrich’s body, even though the grenade failed to enter the car. Kubiš was also injured by the shrapnel. Heydrich, apparently unaware of his shrapnel injuries, got out of the car, returned fire, and tried to chase Gabčík but soon collapsed. Klein returned from his abortive attempt to chase Kubiš, and Heydrich ordered him to chase Gabčík. Klein was shot twice by Gabčík (who was now using his revolver) and wounded in the pursuit. The assassins were initially convinced that the attack had failed.
Heydrich was taken to Bulovka Hospital, 2.5 km from the site of the attack.... [S]urgeons reinflated the collapsed left lung, removed the tip of the fractured eleventh rib, sutured the torn diaphragm, inserted several catheters and removed the spleen.... The patient developed a fever of 38-39 °C and wound drainage. After 7 days his condition appeared to be improving, when he collapsed and went into shock, dying the next morning....
Himmler’s physicians described the cause of death as of septicemia (blood poisoning). Their theory was that some of the horsehair used in the upholstery of Heydrich’s car was forced into his body by the blast of the grenade, causing a systemic infection. In light of the rumours that Heydrich was the one man of whom Himmler was both jealous and truly afraid, the validity of this diagnosis, and the intentions of Himmler’s doctors, have been open to much speculation.....
Hitler ordered the SS and Gestapo to “wade in blood” throughout Bohemia to find Heydrich’s killers. Hitler wanted to start with brutal, widespread killing of the Czech people but, after consultations, he reduced his response to only some thousands.... More than 13,000 people were ultimately arrested, including the girlfriend of Jan Kubiš, Anna Malinová, who died in the Mauthausen concentration camp....
The attackers initially hid with two Prague families and later took refuge in Karel Boromejsky Church, an Orthodox church dedicated to Saints Cyril and Methodius in Prague. The Gestapo could not find the assassins until Karel Čurda (of the group Out Distance, whose objective was sabotage), was arrested and told the Gestapo the names of the team’s local contact persons for the bounty of 1 million Reichsmarks. Čurda betrayed several safe houses provided by the Jindra group, including that of the Moravec family in Žižkov. At 5 a.m. on June 17, the Moravec apartment was raided. The family was made to stand in the corridor while the Gestapo searched their apartment. Mrs. Moravec was allowed to go to the toilet, and killed herself with a cyanide capsule. Mr. Moravec, oblivious to his family's involvement with the resistance, was taken to the Peček Palác together with his son Ata. Ata was tortured throughout the day. Finally, he was stupefied with brandy and shown his mother's severed head in a fish tank.
Ata Moravec told the Gestapo all he knew. SS troops laid siege to the church but, despite the best efforts of over 700 Nazi soldiers, they were unable to take the paratroopers alive; 3, including Heydrich’s assassin Kubiš, were killed in the prayer loft (Kubiš was said to have survived the battle, but died shortly afterward from his injuries) after a 2-hour gun battle. The other four, including Gabčík, committed suicide in the crypt after fending off SS attacks.... The Germans (SS and Police) also had casualites; SS casualties being 14 killed and 21 wounded.
Bishop Gorazd, in an attempt to minimize the reprisals among his flock, took the blame for the actions in the Church on himself, even writing letters to the Nazi authorities. On June 27, 1942, he was arrested and tortured. On September 4, 1942, he, the Church priests, and senior lay leaders were executed by firing squad....
As Heydrich was one of the most important Nazi leaders, two large funeral ceremonies were conducted. One was in Prague, where the way to Prague Castle was lined by thousands of SS-men with torches. The second was in Berlin attended by all leading Nazi figures, including Hitler who placed the German Order and Blood Order Medals on the funeral pillow.
Karel Čurda, after attempting suicide, was hanged in 1947 for high treason...
