Jud Süß (1940) - Definitely an ugly piece of antisemitism propaganda - 4/10 (18/12/11)

"Jud Süss" is without a doubt one of the most racist and radical propaganda movies and has been banned in several countries. Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels described the movie once as the absolute antisemitism movie. The movie is indeed filled with stereotypes and wrong historic connections and interpretations. As minus points are not possible, I would give the lowest rating to the intellectual part, the story and the message of this ugly piece of art.

If we have a look on the rest, this movie is quite well acted and succeeds in his dishonourable goals as he really creates the image of a egoistic, capitalist and pitiless finance minister that brings evil over an entire population. Apart of this main character, we have many appealing secondary characters. There is the naive and beautiful young girl that sacrifices her life for her husband and the march of rebellion. Her husband is a tough and courageous man with a lot of charisma. The father of the girl is an honest, direct and sage man that seeks for justice rather than for vengeance. The decorations and costumes of the movie are detailed and luxurious. The creators of this movie put a lot of works and details into this entertaining and emotional movie. For the costumes, the filming techniques and the acting, I would normally give at least seven or even eight points.

But the truth is that the propaganda of antisemitism can't be weighted up by the rest as this movie constantly focuses on this and its only purpose is to show how dangerous and evil Jewish people are. The ending of the movie even justifies the acts of the Nazi government to ban Jewish people and don't let them play any role in society.

Even though the film is banned in several countries, historians still get access to this movie with certain permissions and I was able to watch this movie in order to write a dissertation about propaganda movies at the university. From a historical point of view, this movie played a very important role and is surely a stunning document of its time, society and ideology under the swastika. This movie can easily portray the lies and propaganda if you know and understand the horrible background of its creation. This movie should be considered as a warning how easily people can get manipulated by the medias and watching this flick really sharpened my senses for this topic. One should nowadays avoid this disgusting content without a doubt. On the other side, one shall not forget that this kind of films have been made and are still made nowadays in countries with radical leaders and have a shocking impact.If I sum all of this up mathematically, I might give four points to this movie even though I hate its message and wish this would have never been created to support the genocide of millions of innocent people under a reign of absolute terror and holocaust.