Fritz Hippler (17 August 1909 – 22 May 2002) was a German

filmmaker Filmmaking or film production is the process by which a Film, motion picture is produced. Filmmaking involves a number of complex and discrete stages, beginning with an initial story, idea, or commission. Production then continues through screen ...

who ran the film department in the Propaganda Ministry of

Nazi Germany Nazi Germany, officially known as the German Reich and later the Greater German Reich, was the German Reich, German state between 1933 and 1945, when Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party controlled the country, transforming it into a Totalit ...

, under

Joseph Goebbels Paul Joseph Goebbels (; 29 October 1897 – 1 May 1945) was a German Nazism, Nazi politician and philologist who was the ''Gauleiter'' (district leader) of Berlin, chief Propaganda in Nazi Germany, propagandist for the Nazi Party, and ...

. He is best known as the director of the propaganda film '' Der Ewige Jude (The Eternal Jew)''.

Early life and education

Hippler was born and brought up in

Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...

as the son of a petty official. His father died in 1918 in the

First World War World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

in France. Hippler resented the

Treaty of Versailles The Treaty of Versailles was a peace treaty signed on 28 June 1919. As the most important treaty of World War I, it ended the state of war between Germany and most of the Allies of World War I, Allied Powers. It was signed in the Palace ...

and its associated regulations, such as the assignment of the Danzig Corridor, the occupation of the

Rhineland The Rhineland ( ; ; ; ) is a loosely defined area of Western Germany along the Rhine, chiefly Middle Rhine, its middle section. It is the main industrial heartland of Germany because of its many factories, and it has historic ties to the Holy ...

and the disarmament of Germany as unjustified humiliation, and rejected the Weimar democracy. In 1925 when he was 17, Hippler joined the

Nazi Party The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party ( or NSDAP), was a far-right politics, far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that created and supported the ideology of Nazism. Its precursor ...

.Artists under Hitler: Collaboration and Survival under Nazi Germany
page 30 In 1927, Hippler became a member of the NSD Studentbund - the

National Socialist German Students' League The National Socialist German Students' Union ( German: ''Nationalsozialistischer Deutscher Studentenbund'', abbreviated NSDStB) was founded in 1926 as a division of the Nazi Party with the mission of integrating University-level education and ...

. Later he studied law in

Heidelberg Heidelberg (; ; ) is the List of cities in Baden-Württemberg by population, fifth-largest city in the States of Germany, German state of Baden-Württemberg, and with a population of about 163,000, of which roughly a quarter consists of studen ...

and

. He was a member of the ' dueling society in Heidelberg and the '' Arminia'' dueling society in Berlin. In 1932 he became NSDAP district speaker. In 1933 he was appointed the district and high school group leader for Berlin-Brandenburg in the National Socialist German Students' League. Hippler was a supporter of

expressionism Expressionism is a modernist movement, initially in poetry and painting, originating in Northern Europe around the beginning of the 20th century. Its typical trait is to present the world solely from a subjective perspective, distorting it rad ...

. As the leader of the National Socialist German Students' League of Berlin he organised an exhibition in

Humboldt University of Berlin The Humboldt University of Berlin (, abbreviated HU Berlin) is a public research university in the central borough of Mitte in Berlin, Germany. The university was established by Frederick William III on the initiative of Wilhelm von Humbol ...

for expressionist painters, for which he was vehemently attacked by the Nazi ideologist Alfred Rosenberg. In 1932, Hippler was expelled from the

University of Berlin The Humboldt University of Berlin (, abbreviated HU Berlin) is a public research university in the central borough of Mitte in Berlin, Germany. The university was established by Frederick William III on the initiative of Wilhelm von Humbol ...

for participating in violent Nazi rallies. On 19 April 1933, the new National Socialist Education Minister Bernhard Rust repealed any disciplinary actions against students associated with the NSDAP, thus reinstating Hippler. On 22 May 1933, he gave a speech initiating a march from the student house in the Oranienburger Straße to Opera Square with books which were then burned. In June 1933 Hippler participated in a violent rally opposite the stock exchange, against

Alfred Hugenberg Alfred Ernst Christian Alexander Hugenberg (19 June 1865 – 12 March 1951) was an influential German businessman and politician. An important figure in nationalist politics in Germany during the first three decades of the twentieth century, ...

then minister of finance and still Hitler's rival, calling Hitler to disavow him and remove him from power. Hippler was later involved in a dispute over the direction of arts policy. He was satisfied with the anti-Jewish orientation of the arts policy and the consequent banishment of that art from museums and art dealers who had been created by Jews. However, in July 1933 at a rally of the National Socialist Student League in the lecture hall of the Berlin University, he criticised the harsh action of some Nazi circles against the German modern artists like Emile Nolde and Barlach, the artists group

Die Brücke Die Brücke (The Bridge), also known as Künstlergruppe Brücke or KG Brücke, was a group of German expressionist artists formed in Dresden in 1905. The founding members were Fritz Bleyl, Erich Heckel, Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, and Karl Schmidt-R ...

, which was propagated by elements of the Nazi leadership as part of efforts against the Degenerate Art. Although Goebbels was a lover of Nolde, this direction after a word of argument was in favour of the more radical of Hitler's National Socialists, whose spokesman was Alfred Rosenberg and his Combat League for German Culture. Fritz Hippler earned his

PhD A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, DPhil; or ) is a terminal degree that usually denotes the highest level of academic achievement in a given discipline and is awarded following a course of graduate study and original research. The name of the deg ...

in 1934 at the Heidelberg University with

Arnold Bergstraesser Arnold Bergstraesser (14 July 1896, Darmstadt – 24 February 1964, Freiburg im Breisgau) was a German political scientist. Along with Wolfgang Abendroth, Karl Dietrich Bracher, Theodor Eschenburg, and Eric Voegelin, he was one of the foun ...

and a dissertation titled "State and Society in the Thinking of

John Stuart Mill John Stuart Mill (20 May 1806 – 7 May 1873) was an English philosopher, political economist, politician and civil servant. One of the most influential thinkers in the history of liberalism and social liberalism, he contributed widely to s ...

Karl Marx Karl Marx (; 5 May 1818 – 14 March 1883) was a German philosopher, political theorist, economist, journalist, and revolutionary socialist. He is best-known for the 1848 pamphlet '' The Communist Manifesto'' (written with Friedrich Engels) ...

, and Paul de Lagarde. A contribution to the sociological thinking of the present time".

Career in film production

After receiving his doctorate in 1934, Hippler became a lecturer at the German University of Policy in Berlin. From 1936 he worked as assistant to Hans Weidemann working on the production of German

newsreel A newsreel is a form of short documentary film, containing news, news stories and items of topical interest, that was prevalent between the 1910s and the mid 1970s. Typically presented in a Movie theater, cinema, newsreels were a source of cu ...

s, directed in the Reich Ministry for Public Enlightenment and Propaganda. Here he learned the production of documentaries. In January 1939, he took over Weidemann's position. In August 1939, Goebbels promoted Hippler again. He appointed the 29-year-old Hippler to head the film department at the Reich Ministry for Public Enlightenment and Propaganda RMVP. In February 1942, he appointed him to the kingdom of film directors. With these two functions Hippler was one of the most important politicians of the film "Third Reich" after Goebbels. In October 1942, he was Director in the RMVP. His task was control, supervision and direction of German filmmaking. In 1938, Hippler was appointed to the rank of SS '' Hauptsturmführer''. According to

Veit Harlan Veit Harlan (22 September 1899 – 13 April 1964) was a German film director and actor. Harlan reached the high point of his career as a director in the Nazi era; most notably his antisemitic film '' Jud Süß'' (1940) makes him controversial. W ...

, Hippler loved to wear his SS uniform. In his ministerial functions, Hippler continued to produce films. In 1939-40 he was responsible for the propaganda film ''The campaign in Poland''. In 1940, he was responsible for the management and design of the feature-length documentary film '' The Eternal Jew''—according to Courtade, ''History of Film in the Third Reich'', "the vilest anti-Semitic Nazi films." The film historian Frank Noack assessed ''The Eternal Jew'' as "probably the most radical inflammatory film of all time". An article written by Hippler in the magazine "The film" about its creation marked Jews as "parasites of national degeneracy." He deliberately filmed conditions within the

Warsaw Ghetto The Warsaw Ghetto (, officially , ; ) was the largest of the Nazi ghettos during World War II and the Holocaust. It was established in November 1940 by the Nazi Germany, German authorities within the new General Government territory of Occupat ...

to show the starving inhabitants, conditions designed by the Germans to increase the death rate. The film served as a preparation and agreement of the population in the coming

holocaust The Holocaust (), known in Hebrew language, Hebrew as the (), was the genocide of History of the Jews in Europe, European Jews during World War II. From 1941 to 1945, Nazi Germany and Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy ...

and was mainly used for training of police and SS troops. In the same year, as recognition for his service to the Reich, Adolf Hitler bestowed a secret endowment of 60,000 Reichsmarks to Hippler. In addition to ''The Eternal Jew'' Hippler also directed the 1940 propaganda documentary '' Feldzug in Polen'' about the Third Reich's invasion and occupation of

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...

in 1939, and '' Die Frontschau (The Frontshow)'', a series of shorts shown to soldiers before being shipped to the Eastern Front. In 1942, Hippler published a book about

film theory Film theory is a set of scholarly approaches within the academic discipline of film or cinema studies that began in the 1920s by questioning the formal essential attributes of motion pictures; and that now provides conceptual frameworks for und ...

titled ''Betrachtungen zum Filmschaffen'' (i.e., ''Contemplations on Filmmaking''), which included a preface by Emil Jannings. By 1943, he was promoted to Obersturmbannführer.

Conflict with Goebbels

Goebbels could usually count on his young people. Nevertheless, he frequently criticized their shortcomings. As early as 1939, he recorded in his diaries that Hippler was intelligent but cheeky and totally contradictory. He also stated that Hippler was immature. Goebbels complained repeatedly about the disorganisation of the film department. Hippler suffered apparently with alcohol addiction. Goebbels finally discharged Hippler in June 1943 due to "mishaps, alcoholism, and family problems”, although Hippler claimed in his memoirs that he was removed due to his choice of Erich Kaestner for the screenplay of the film ''Münchhausen'' even though several of Kaestner's books and plays had been banned by the Nazis in 1933. After his dismissal, Hippler was accused of falsely denying his partial Jewish descent and demoted from his SS rank. Hippler was sent to an infantry replacement battalion of the country, according to Strauss and underwent mountain infantry training. Then he was again released from active duty and used until February 1945 as a front cameraman in order to produce material for newsreels. On 3 May 1945, he flew into

Hamburg Hamburg (, ; ), officially the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg,. is the List of cities in Germany by population, second-largest city in Germany after Berlin and List of cities in the European Union by population within city limits, 7th-lar ...

as a British

prisoner of war A prisoner of war (POW) is a person held captive by a belligerent power during or immediately after an armed conflict. The earliest recorded usage of the phrase "prisoner of war" dates back to 1610. Belligerents hold prisoners of war for a ...

Postwar

After the end of the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, Hippler was interned and sentenced to two years in prison. He was able to stage a comeback after his release. He was interviewed in the

Bill Moyers Bill Moyers (born Billy Don Moyers; June 5, 1934) is an American journalist and political commentator. Under the Johnson administration he served from 1965 to 1967 as the eleventh White House Press Secretary. He was a director of the Council ...

PBS documentary series ''A Walk Through the 20th Century'' in 1982. Hippler died on 22 May 2002, at the age of 92. He is portrayed by

Cary Elwes Ivan Simon Cary Elwes (; born 26 October 1962) is an English actor. He starred as Westley in ''The Princess Bride (film), The Princess Bride'' (1987), and also had lead roles in films such as ''Robin Hood: Men in Tights'' (1993) and the Saw (fr ...

in the 2001 television film '' Uprising'', and by in the 2010 film '' Jew Suss: Rise and Fall''.

Filmography

*'' Wort und Tat'' ''Words and Deeds''. A documentary film 1938, director *'' Der Westwall'' ''The Western Wall'' 1939, director *'' Feldzug in Polen'' ''Campaign in Poland'' 1939–40, director * ''Der ewige Jude'' (''The Eternal Jew'') "Film contribution to the problem of world Jewry" (1940, directed, co-ordination) *Several short film revues for the '' Die Frontschau'' (''The Front Show'') (1941, director) *'' Sieg im Westen'' (''Victory in the West'') (1941, producer), a film about the campaign against France and the Benelux countries. *'' Der Fuhrer und Sein Volk'' (1942, director) *'' Orient Express'' (1944, producer) *Interview with Hippler (1981, ''A Walk Through the 20th Century'')

Books

*"Betrachtungen zum Filmschaffen", 2nd Ed, Berlin (Hesse's Publishing) 1942 *"Die Verstrickung. Einstellungen und Rückblenden von Fritz Hippler ehemaliger Reichsfilmintendant unter Josef Goebbels", Düsseldorf revised second Edition 1982 *"Meinungsdressur?. Ein heiter-kritisches Fernsehtagebuch", Mountain / Lake Starnberg () 1985 *"Verbrecher Mensch? Die Beobachtungen des Historikers Johannes Scherr", Mountain / Lake Starnberg ( ) 1987 *"Schopenhauer heute. Denkanstöße und Kostproben", Mountain / Lake Starnberg (Türmer-Verlag) 1988 *"Korrekturen: Zeitgeschichtliche Spurensuche, einmal anders", Mountain / Lake Starnberg ( Mountain Publishing Company ) 1995 *"Einspruch Euer Ehren: Den Zeitgeist an den Pranger. Narreteien aus der deutschen Provinz", Mountain / Lake Starnberg (Mountain Publishing Company) 1999

References

External links

*

a Hippler essay from a Nazi magazine translated into English
an interview with HipplerJoseph Goebbels und der Deutsche Film DOKU
(BBC 1993, YouTube) {{DEFAULTSORT:Hippler, Fritz 1909 births 2002 deaths Antisemitism in Germany German documentary film directors Film people from Berlin German Nazi propagandists Film theorists People from the Province of Brandenburg German propaganda film directors SS-Hauptsturmführer German prisoners of war in World War II held by the United Kingdom Nazis convicted of crimes