WORLD AT WAR, THE, PART 16: INSIDE THE REICH (TV)
Summary
Part sixteen in this twenty-six-part documentary series chronicling the history of World War II. This installment depicts conditions within Germany from 1940 to 1944. Highlights include the following: elated by the success of the blitzkrieg in Poland and France, the Wehrmacht returns to triumphant fanfare in Berlin; war frenzy reaches its peak as Germany anticipates a swift victory; Reich Minister Hans Kehrl recalls how his warnings to the upper brass regarding American intervention went unheeded; excerpts are shown from "Mutterliebe," a state-sponsored film on the joys of motherhood; Christaber Bielenberg remembers how her family leaned in close to the radio to catch forbidden British news reports, which presented a drastically different picture of Germany from the one painted by Propaganda Minister Josef Goebbels; Friedricht Luft recalls his frustrations over the government-controlled press; the invasion of Russia shatters the optimistic expectations of the populace; Goebbels rallies the people into committing themselves to "total war"; when armaments minister Fritz Todt is killed in a plane crash, Albert Speer is promoted as administrator of war industry -- he talks at length of his pivotal role in the Nazi regime; to aid the war effort, Ukranian women are conscripted into forced labor; Adolf Hitler's adjutant, Richard Schulze, profiles the members of the FŸhrer's inner circle -- Bormann, Goerring, and Himmler; with 250,000 men lost, the Battle of Stalingrad demoralizes the population and brings a crushing dose of reality to Hitler, whose reaction to the defeat is detailed by his secretary at the time, Traudl Junge; children in the Hitler Youth are mobilized into factory work, and eventually, into combat; the ferocity of the Allied bombing and the systematic incineration of major German cities, including Hamburg, where 40,000 residents are killed in ten days; a profile of ReichsfŸhrer-SS Heinrich Himmler, leader of the SchŸtzstaffel (SS), the elite corps which served as the instrument of German dominion over Europe and organized the elimination of "undesirables"; Hertha Beese, a Berlin housewife, talks about hiding Jews in her house; Emmi Bonhšffer recalls the warning she received from her neighbors when she tried to discuss the rumors circulating about the fate of Jews hauled off to "resettlement camps"; opposition within the Reich grows, culminating in a series of assassination attempts on Hitler and other Nazi officials; for their role in planting a bomb which nearly killed the FŸhrer, Col. Count Klaus von Stauffenberg, Maj. Gen. Helmuth Stieff, and other key conspirators are hanged by piano wire -- their trial is presided over by Roland Freisler, star judge of the Nazis; Hitler becomes increasingly paranoid and mistrusts his military advisors, preferring to direct the war more or less alone; as Allied bombing raids disable German productivity, crippled and injured veterans are recruited into the work force; Home Guards, composed of the elderly, the underage, and the unfit, are sworn into service to protect their cities from the encroaching Allied forces; and Hitler, refusing to confront the devastation in the capital, travels through Berlin only at night. Commercials deleted.
Details
- NETWORK: Thames (United Kingdom)
- DATE: February 20, 1974
- RUNNING TIME: 0:50:29
- COLOR/B&W: Color and B&W
- CATALOG ID: T82:0208
- GENRE: Public affairs/Documentaries
- SUBJECT HEADING: Assassination attempts; Germany - History - 1939-1945; International Collection - United Kingdom; Nazism; Thames Collection; World War II
- SERIES RUN: Thames (United Kingdom) - TV series, 1973-1974
- COMMERCIALS: N/A
CREDITS
- Jeremy Isaacs … Producer
- Phillip Whitehead … Producer
- Noble Frankland … Production (Misc.), Historical Adviser
- Neal Ascherson … Writer
- Carl Davis … Music by
- Laurence Olivier … Narrator
- Hertha Beese
- Christaber Bielenberg
- Emmi Bonhšffer
- Traudl Junge
- Friedricht Luft
- Hans Kehrl
- Richard Schulze
- Albert Speer
- Marlene Tucking
- Joseph Goebbels
- Martin Bormann
- Roland Freisler
- Hermann Gšring
- Heinrich Himmler
- Adolf Hitler
- Walther von Reichenau
- Klaus von Stauffenberg
- Helmuth Stieff