Reading the biography of producer Ben Judell of Hitler - Beast of Berlin I was feeling sorry for the man and his efforts to get this film out to the public. Obviously he put his heart and soul in it. I also saw that he produced that camp classic, Hitler - Dead or Alive during the Forties. His artistic problems became clearer then.
Imagine if you would an anti-Nazi film if produced and directed by Ed Wood and you've got Hitler - Beast of Berlin. It's well meaning, but made completely on a shoestring budget with a cast of unknowns. If it were not for the presence of Alan Ladd in one of his bit roles before he reached stardom in This Gun For Hire, no one would consider this film in any way worth salvaging. By the way, Ladd adopted an absolutely atrocious German accent for the part.
The skimpy plot as it were involves Roland Drew and Steffi Duna, an earnest pair of young anti-Nazi Germans involved in a circle of conspirators. They are accidentally betrayed and the whole group, Ladd included, are rounded up and sent to a concentration camp. Duna tries to get her husband freed and in the end she does.
What I found interesting was the producer's conception of what a concentration camp was like in 1939. Remember this was before the Final Solution was put into affect and reports to the western allies were few and far between. It doesn't look too much different from one of those southern prisons with work farms and chain gangs except the guards all wear Nazi uniforms and swastikas.
It's all terribly earnest and terribly silly. What I'd like to know is that when Duna and Drew are finally free and over the border, do they wind up in Rick's Cafe Americaine in Casablanca?
Imagine if you would an anti-Nazi film if produced and directed by Ed Wood and you've got Hitler - Beast of Berlin. It's well meaning, but made completely on a shoestring budget with a cast of unknowns. If it were not for the presence of Alan Ladd in one of his bit roles before he reached stardom in This Gun For Hire, no one would consider this film in any way worth salvaging. By the way, Ladd adopted an absolutely atrocious German accent for the part.
The skimpy plot as it were involves Roland Drew and Steffi Duna, an earnest pair of young anti-Nazi Germans involved in a circle of conspirators. They are accidentally betrayed and the whole group, Ladd included, are rounded up and sent to a concentration camp. Duna tries to get her husband freed and in the end she does.
What I found interesting was the producer's conception of what a concentration camp was like in 1939. Remember this was before the Final Solution was put into affect and reports to the western allies were few and far between. It doesn't look too much different from one of those southern prisons with work farms and chain gangs except the guards all wear Nazi uniforms and swastikas.
It's all terribly earnest and terribly silly. What I'd like to know is that when Duna and Drew are finally free and over the border, do they wind up in Rick's Cafe Americaine in Casablanca?