523 Night Train to Munich

[Jonathan S]

Personally, I've no problem with Night Train to Munich; it doesn't pretend to be more than a piece of light entertainment, and I've enjoyed it several times over the last 40 years, though I've never wanted to own it.

I do find interesting, however, the dichotomy between what was published and what was (allowed to be) screened during the war. It must have been like living in two different worlds. My parents, avid readers, always maintained that - even before and after the war - they went to the cinema to be entertained and they read (books, including novels, more than newspapers) to find truth. I remember even in the 1960s they told me they didn't believe anything on the BBC, as it was government-controlled!

I can understand the economy with the truth (for whatever reasons) in wartime films, but am disturbed by the way history is rewritten by the media - to take a trivial example, all the current adulation of Dame Vera Lynn as the "Forces Sweetheart".... my uncle, in the RAF during the war, told me they hated her and used to chuck their boots at the radio when she came on!

[MichaelB]

This recent article touches on a similar theme:

The blitz did not provide a respite from human greed, bureaucratic idiocy and official meanness. "Don't talk to me about everyone pulling together," says David Clark, who was a little boy when his home in Ilford suffered a direct hit. The family was safe in its Anderson shelter, "but the neighbours and the ARP [Air Raid Precautions wardens] assumed we were dead and looted the house. They didn't get the fish knives or the port decanter and I still have those."

Such stories do not form part of our collective memory of the war. As Angus Calder writes in The Myth of the Blitz, "Successful after-raid looters have not written their memoirs. Cowardly people in local government have not advertised their shame."

[John Hodson]

...and Eastenders booing the King and Queen, and stoning Churchill, as they enjoyed their photo ops during the blitz, RAF ground crews refusing to emerge from bomb shelters to repair runway damage during the Battle of Britain, despite being threatened at gunpoint; these stories and more have been widely known for decades, but most media would rather print the legend.

[HistoryProf]

The intention was simply to invoke history to show that any sane person should have been aware by 1939, before war was declared, of what was going on in Hitler's Reich.

I know - knew - quite a few 'sane people' who, whilst aware that to be Jewish in Hitler's Europe was Not A Good Thing, were horrified to learn after the war of the scale of the insanity, that people were exterminated on an industrial scale. It was simply beyond belief.

Reed's film is what it is; that it chooses not to, ostensibly, reveal the Nazis as mass murderers to be has nothing to do, IMHO, with the turning of collective (or singular) backs. But hey, who knows, it could be conclusive evidence of contemporary Britain as a nest of smug, self-interested, anti-Semitic bastards.

that's not a choice in 1939...that's a simple truth. The mass murder that we all know had not begun in 1939. Yes, Kristallnacht was in 1938, but the Einsatzgruppen did not start their dirty work at Babi Yar (where 33,000 Russian Jews were executed over a period of days) and elsewhere until 1941, and the construction of gas chambers and ovens was put into effect around then into 1942 - which were created after events like Babi Yar where they realized it took a really really long time to shoot 33,000 people 25 at a time - never mind the piles of bodies they had to contend with.

So all that nastiness had yet to happen when Munich was both written and filmed - and even released to audiences. It's thus completely specious to apply that hindsight to any sort of criticism of what the film does or does not do. Everyone simply underestimated Hitler's potential - because what he engineered was incomprehensible, and remains so today. The British of 1939 were leery of him, certainly looked at Germany with disdain, but probably saw him as Wilhelm 2.0 w/ extra anti-semitism. Add in the fact that while everyone could agree that the persecution of Jews was a bad thing, for political reasons neither the British or Americans really wanted to take them on either. Americans were also well aware Hitler was bad...but no one suspected what was to come, but nor did they exactly open their arms to jewish emigrees. There is some fascinating history there where even American Jews were hesitant to allow mass migrations to America because they knew it would harm THEIR tenuous standing in the U.S.

[Lemmy Caution]

In 1939, the Nazis themselves were not yet committed to genocide.
In 1939 and 1940 one of the Nazi solutions to rid Europe of Jews proposed shipping them to French controlled Madagascar. The Madagascar Plan seems to have been envisioned as a sort of ethnic prison colony to be loosely administered by the Nazis. The plan apparently hinged upon defeating the French to get rights to the colony, then toppling the British and using their fleet of ships for transport, all paid for by confiscating Jewish property and assets. In 1939, not even this radical, but less deadly, mass plan to remove Jews would have been known outside the Nazi command.
The first Jewish ghettos in Poland were formed by the Nazis in late 1939; the Warsaw ghetto wasn't built until mid 1940, etc.

[aox]

In 1939 and 1940 one of the Nazi solutions to rid Europe of Jews proposed shipping them to French controlled Madagascar. The Madagascar Plan seems to have been envisioned as a sort of ethnic prison colony to be loosely administered by the Nazis. The plan apparently hinged upon defeating the French to get rights to the colony, then toppling the British and using their fleet of ships for transport, all paid for by confiscating Jewish property and assets. In 1939, not even this radical, but less deadly, mass plan to remove Jews would have been known outside the Nazi command.

I know this was a real plan and is verified with documents; however, the way you describe, it sounds like an off-the-cuff wishful plan delivered by a bunch of grumpy old men over scotch and cigars in the backroom of a country-club, each trying to one-up the others absurdity to get a laugh.

[Lemmy Caution]

It sounds rather implausible, but mostly because it never happened.
Is it any less far-fetched than mass deportations, gassings and cremations?
The origin of the Madagascar plan was a gross perversion of the concept of Zionism, specifically the the Uganda proposal that at one time was considered by some as a possible Jewish refuge.

[HistoryProf]

This recent article touches on a similar theme:

The blitz did not provide a respite from human greed, bureaucratic idiocy and official meanness. "Don't talk to me about everyone pulling together," says David Clark, who was a little boy when his home in Ilford suffered a direct hit. The family was safe in its Anderson shelter, "but the neighbours and the ARP [Air Raid Precautions wardens] assumed we were dead and looted the house. They didn't get the fish knives or the port decanter and I still have those."

Such stories do not form part of our collective memory of the war. As Angus Calder writes in The Myth of the Blitz, "Successful after-raid looters have not written their memoirs. Cowardly people in local government have not advertised their shame."

thanks for posting this...that book looks fantastic, too bad it's only being released in the UK - can't believe an American publisher isn't publishing it. I've been looking for a book on the Blitz for ages, but what's available here just never seemed to cut it for me.

[Matango]

This recent article touches on a similar theme:

The blitz did not provide a respite from human greed, bureaucratic idiocy and official meanness. "Don't talk to me about everyone pulling together," says David Clark, who was a little boy when his home in Ilford suffered a direct hit. The family was safe in its Anderson shelter, "but the neighbours and the ARP [Air Raid Precautions wardens] assumed we were dead and looted the house. They didn't get the fish knives or the port decanter and I still have those."

Such stories do not form part of our collective memory of the war. As Angus Calder writes in The Myth of the Blitz, "Successful after-raid looters have not written their memoirs. Cowardly people in local government have not advertised their shame."

thanks for posting this...that book looks fantastic, too bad it's only being released in the UK - can't believe an American publisher isn't publishing it. I've been looking for a book on the Blitz for ages, but what's available here just never seemed to cut it for me.

Fantastic? It gets some pretty lousy reviews on Amzon.co.uk. I'd look around some more for other books on the same site if I was you.

[HistoryProf]

well I was merely going by that article (it's listing on Amazon.co.uk that I can see doesn't have any reviews - we talking about the same book? Juliet Gardiner, _The Blitz: The British Under Attack_ just published 9/2/10?) - hopeful that it was a look at the people who lived and died through the Blitz rather than a tepid retelling of the military and political sides - which too much WWII history is. It's a shame if this one fails too, but that article made it sound like a much needed exploration of what it was like on the ground, so to speak.

[Matango]

well I was merely going by that article (it's listing on Amazon.co.uk that I can see doesn't have any reviews - we talking about the same book? Juliet Gardiner, _The Blitz: The British Under Attack_ just published 9/2/10?) - hopeful that it was a look at the people who lived and died through the Blitz rather than a tepid retelling of the military and political sides - which too much WWII history is. It's a shame if this one fails too, but that article made it sound like a much needed exploration of what it was like on the ground, so to speak.

No, sorry, I thought you were talking about The Myth of the Blitz, mentioned above.

[aox]

It sounds rather implausible, but mostly because it never happened.
Is it any less far-fetched than mass deportations, gassings and cremations?
The origin of the Madagascar plan was a gross perversion of the concept of Zionism, specifically the the Uganda proposal that at one time was considered by some as a possible Jewish refuge.

I am sure this is just a general statement, but I wasn't trying to imply otherwise. And yes, I get the Hertzl link; though, I doubt the Nazis would have seen it that way.

Simply put: I agree with you.

[HistoryProf]

well I was merely going by that article (it's listing on Amazon.co.uk that I can see doesn't have any reviews - we talking about the same book? Juliet Gardiner, _The Blitz: The British Under Attack_ just published 9/2/10?) - hopeful that it was a look at the people who lived and died through the Blitz rather than a tepid retelling of the military and political sides - which too much WWII history is. It's a shame if this one fails too, but that article made it sound like a much needed exploration of what it was like on the ground, so to speak.

No, sorry, I thought you were talking about The Myth of the Blitz, mentioned above.

my bad....the Gardiner book is quoted at the end of the article, so that was what stuck with me and I know of her previous work _Wartime: Britain 1939-1945_ which is very well-reviewed (But also not available in the U.S.)...Would love to know the thoughts of any of our UK members if they pick it up.

[Cheerupemokid]

As somebody who came into viewing the film really not knowing much about it or expecting anything from it, I absolutely loved Night Train To Munich. I'll admit, at first some of the Nazi elements were a bit surprising (it really is one of those things that you have to stop and consider when the movie was made and what knowledge was known and accepted back then, as much of the conversation in this great thread has touched on) and it took me a bit to warm up to the story. By mid-way through, I was fully engaged. And by the finale, I was sitting at the edge of my seat, thrilled to see what would happen in the end.

Looking at this entirely as a purely entertaining film, it is fantastic. Lots of great, clever comedy, and some really well built moments of suspense. I cannot wait to watch it again, and watch The Lady Vanishes, which I've yet to see but from all accounts expect to enjoy possibly even more than Night Train.

[scotty2]

It is interesting that Charters is reading (or attempting to read) Mein Kampf as a running gag in the film. The thread has discussed the level of knowledge or ignorance that the British public would have had at the time of the film's debut. Charters says he can't get past Hitler's boyhood. Is it possible that by positioning Charters in this way, the filmmakers are suggesting that the rest of the book really should be read in order to understand just what the world is up against in Hitler? That's probably giving them too much credit, as the book seems to be an aspect of the commonplace lampooning of Hitler at that time, but Charters' curiosity about the Nazi threat and his failure to get to the "bad stuff" seems strangely symbolic of the public's knowledge of Hitler and the dangers he posed.

[djproject]

Blu-ray upgrade due 6 Sep 2016

[cdnchris]

I wonder if they just throw darts at titles to pick what to upgrade.

[zedz]

Great! Now people can stop harassing Criterion with demands for this upgrade!

(But seriously, it's a charming film and well worth a look if you haven't caught up with it yet.)

[cdnchris]

Agreed, I like it well enough. Just screams "random" for me, I guess.

[TMDaines]

Now I have to sell the DVD and import this before I get around to watching it.

[Ribs]

Guess Odd Man Out sold well.

[domino harvey]

Or it took six years for the DVD to sell out!

[feihong]

I haven't even upgraded The Lady Vanishes yet. Now I'm supposed to buy this bluray?

Seriously, though, I suppose I should be excited whenever they do an upgrade. I like to think it brings us just a little bit closer to having some more Suzuki Upgrades, like Gate of Flesh, or hopefully Kanto Wanderer. So bring on the Night Train!

[FrauBlucher]

Beaver

[Minkin]

Blu-ray.com