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 [Larger view] | Judgment at Nuremberg
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Average user rating:  | |
 Anti-American Propoganda from Stanley Kramer | |
| Stanley Kramer was an Anti-American liberal member of the
hollywood elite. In this film he uses America's victory over the Nazi menace and its liberation of Europe as an excuse to bash America more than the Nazis. He salts the film with Anti-America references and reverses history at the end of the film to make it look like America freed all the nazis from prison. And guess what? Kramer tells us through his propoganda that it was our life-struggle for Freedom against the soviet union that made us into criminals. Its a wonder the man didn't move to the soviet union he loved it so much. Its a well made film and some of the actors give better performances than the film deserves, but its Anti-American script and direction work against those great performances. There is also a clear plea made in the film for Warren-Court style judicial activism on the part of judges. Kramer is making a liberal argument in favor of Judges legislating from the courtroom. But that wasn't the problem in Nazi Germany. The problem in Nazi Germany was that these judges were evil men working for a fear government. Their holding office in the Nazi government should have been sufficient grounds for prison terms. The trial for these judges should have lasted about five minutes. Did you hold office in the nazi government? Yes - automatic seven years. Did you convict anyone under the following laws - If yes, one more year for each person he convicted. Were you a party member? If yes, five more years. The trials for these men should have been about ten easy questions. Going into why they made decisions under a particular law is irrelivant to the crimes that they are guilty of. If they held office, if they applied criminal laws, if they were party members, then they are guilty. And the nazi lawyer should have been thrown out of court for acting like that. No American judge at Nuremberg would ever have allowed a nazi to abuse witnesses like he did. | |
| a really disappointing film | |
| This isn't really much of a film. Its not really even much
about the real trials at Nuremburg. Its a big hollywood exercise in moral outrage years after the events in question. And the moral outrage is directed all over the map. Its a film that hates America as much (or possibly more) than it hates nazi germany. It goes into american history to "indict" america and then in the end it blames America for not putting more Germans in prison after the war, for not overthrowing hilter..etc. In the end, it becomes less an anti-nazi film and more an anti-cold war/anti-american film. The crimes of the judges are carefully selected in the film. And they are as much (or more) about the american civil rights movement than they are about nazis. The core crimes are anti "race" mixing laws and sterlization laws. Kramer couldn't make a film directly about those issues at the time, but this served as a vehicle to say it another way. The characters are wooden and overly melodramatic at the expense of any realism. Spencer Tracy plays the super-judge with the pure all-american heart who gets all the moralizing sermon lines. In the end, he makes an arguement for "real" law being centered in vengence and how all that fancy book-learnen law is just for moral cowards. The problem with that is that those involved in the film only believed in this concept of "real" law on a selective basis (i.e. in Germany) and against "bad" people. The problem with that theory of law is that law can't decide between the good and the bad before the trial begins. "common sense" application of the law always ends up being politically subjective application of the law. Burt Lancaster, in his usual hammy style, plays the repentant nazi. He isn't convincing as a german judge. What the film doesn't deal with is that the real trials, "repentance" was often false and done in exchange for deals. The worst example being Albert Speer who traded reptentance at trial for "rehabilitation" and a whitewashing of his criminal role. Lancaster would of course soon after go on to make a hero out of a psychopathic killer in birdman of alcatraz. Marlene Dietrich slithers in and out of the film in a rather useless way. But she is mostly in the film just to be seen and probably to make her own moral statement. She could have been put to much better effect in any number of ways. But really, most of the film is just window-dressing anyway. The real purpose of the film at the time was to get the US Army camp liberation films out in front of the public. They are the real center of the film. The issues the film touches on could be used to give people much to think about, but in the end the film wants to do the thinking itself. And its outrage is directed at America rather than at the war criminals. | |
 Big arguments galore... | |
| 1961 was a year of brilliant films. "West Side Story" won most of the Oscars. Also, "The Hustler" with Paul Newman was riveting human drama; "The Guns of Navarone" was a taut WW II thriller that never failed to entertain. Another nominee was "Fanny", a light sweet film which was only a tribute to the great Charles Boyer. The last Best Picture nominee, "Judgment at Nuremberg", was in a class of it's own, a screenplay by Abby Mann and directed by the most maverick Stanley Kramer. Kramer used Spencer Tracy often, and for good reason. Tracy centers this film. Kramer has never shied away from any subject that might make people uncomfortable, whether "Inherit the Wind" or "The Defiant Ones", or, later, "Ship of Fools". He attracts the best actors and has directed many to acting nominations; he also knew how to use a large cast to good advantage (much like our present-day maverick, Robert Altman). Maximillian Schell was auspicious as the defense attorney and won the Oscar (over Tracy, also nominated). Abby Mann's screenplay also won. Schell is, indeed, brilliant; also nominated was Montgomery Clift as the feeble-minded guy (not a stretch, since word has it he was drunk the whole time); the real treat is a sublime and courageous performance by Judy Garland, which will break your heart. I'm also glad that Kramer asked Marlene Dietrich to appear. Aside from her natural beauty, no one seems to remember her wonderful performances in "Morocco", "Golden Earrings" or Hitchcock's "Stage Fright". Here, she's confident and sure, as always. This is a powerful film, as I would expect from Stanley Kramer. Though the names have all been changed, we cannot forget the brutality of the situations involved. We've come a long way, baby...but let's never forget. |
