Uwe Boll makes the Holocaust even worse

JPNor

Shared on Thu, 03/17/2011 - 18:39

I really, really should have learned by now. I saw House of the Dead. I saw Postal. I'm a fan of video games and a fan of movies, so why does Uwe Boll, the shittiest director to ever have been offered a budget, have to be the only person to combine the two?

I'm also a huge fan of WWII history and I'm fascinated by the history of the Holocaust. I read some mixed reviews for Uwe Boll's latest picture, Auschwitz, but decided to check it out anyway. It's a far cry (get it?) from his film adaptations of video games, but unfortunately it's still Uwe Boll.

Granted, I only made it about an hour. And that's only because the first 10 minutes or so were actually entertaining. He starts by interviewing German teenagers about their knowledge of the Holocaust and seeing how horribly miseducated they are about the history of their country. Boll asks one kid when the Holocaust occurred, and he said "It was in the 1800's. 1860 I think." His friend corrected him to say it was closer to 1960. Well, at least he was in the same century.

The film then goes into a dramatization of the day-in, day-out routine of the Jews arriving via train at the Auschwitz death camp. While a trainload of Jews is checking in, another group is being loaded into the gas chamber. Cyanide is poured into the chamber, and you know what happens next.

Then, without rhyme or reason, he recreates the exact same scene with a completely different group. While this is going on we see and hear some interaction between the SS, including some incredibly unsettling scenes inserted for no reason other than Uwe Boll's trademark shock value. But in the entire hour I watched, there was literally only one scene of real dialog. Insert blood, people suffering, and black and white video of nature, and you have an arthouse film, right? No. It's still shit. He clearly is going for arthouse style, and clearly knows nothing about making an arthouse flick. For the record, I can respect when directors take risks, even in shitty artsy flicks. But I can also recognize when something is thrown together by somebody who has no idea how to make a movie.

I gave up during more interviews with more teens. At least one kid knew what the fuck he was talking about, but his education on Nazi Germany consisted of most of the common sense items we all learned in tenth grade history class.

A bunch of people died. Hitler did some bad shit, and Uwe Boll made a bad, shitty film about those people dying. Oops, sorry for the spoiler. I don't consider myself a great writer but I'm convinced that my review is twice as entertaining as the film and you read it in a tenth of the time you would spend watching it.

1/5. The only reason I give it one star is because the first 10 minutes are bearable. Find those 10 minutes on Youtube and skip the rest, and go watch History Channel or something.

Comments

CrypticCat's picture
Submitted by CrypticCat on Thu, 03/17/2011 - 19:38
What irks me greatly is that this focus keeps center. Nazi_germany still hangs over the world as a dark cloud that no one can lift, yet it is almost a century ago and crimes against humanity have occured daily since then till now and will keep occuring from today onward. It's not as if teaching people about the holocaust has done anything for today. Libya is a perfect example. I can't fault his timing though, march through june was the liberation of Europe. The DvD will get some seasonal attention at the very least. I dunno if you can blame the german youths for their ignorance. It's not as if they don't have to pay for the crimes of their forebearers, the rest of Europe is pretty quick to remind them at every turn. Just as I can't be blamed for the Twin Towers for merely being born a muslim, so can't they be blamed for the Holocaust by merely being born german. Today's german youth deserves better.
Nunderw00b's picture
Submitted by Nunderw00b on Thu, 03/17/2011 - 21:31
Uwe Boll=garbage. I long ago vowed to never watch another Uwe Boll movie. After he totally destroyed Eragon, that was enough for me. They have to quit letting this guy attempt to make movies, it's just not his thing.
Habu06's picture
Submitted by Habu06 on Fri, 03/18/2011 - 08:32
I'm not too shocked the German kids didn't know much about the camps or what happened in them. The people who lived near them kept telling the Americans they had no idea what was going on in them even when they were in full operation. Despite the fact that the camps had to have some logistical support from the nearby towns. People had to know, they just decided they didn't want to know.Denial can suppress a lot. You can't blame the current generation of Germans for what their grandparents did but, the rest of Europe can be expected to still hold a slight grudge for Germany embroiling it in the last World War. Yes, there are still crimes against humanity but not on the scale of the "final solution" the Nazis implemented. Personally, I don't blame every Muslim in the world for the acts of Islamist terrorists. Islam is the second (?) largest religion in the world and not every Muslim sits around thinking about killing innocent people and justifing it by saying it's the will of Allah. But there are a bunch who are. I have to admit, I've seen several Uwe Boll movies and I can't explain why. Maybe I keep hoping one will be halfway good.

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