Mommert. Wilfried . "Wartime Germany: Concerts and cinema to the bitter end," Deutsche Presse-Agentur 19 Mar 1995. LexisNexis. 29 Nov 2008

     Nazi Germany had a thriving arts and entertainment culture until all theaters were shut down September of 1944 as a step toward pursuing “total war.” Up until this point, the theaters held regular showings of films and concerts despite the  fact that many were destroyed by Allied bombings.  These theaters were in use until the Nazis were on the edge of defeat.  Despite setbacks with the war and the continued bombings by the Allies, films were still made and shown up until the end of the war.  Twenty eight films were works in progress when the war ended.  Concerts were also still shown regularly. Thirty operas were ready for performance but never actually put on stage.  Resources were still being allocated to put on new operas and films despite the fact that Germany was in "total war," and all resources were allocated to the war effort supposedly.  Film and concerts were the main forms of amusement and diversion for the German people, and the Nazis felt that keeping the masses' minds diverted and happy was still important.
    This article really shows the misguided priorities of the Nazis.  Resources that could have been used for the war effort were misallocated to film production and concert staging.  The Nazis were concerned with appeasing the masses, even though they were about to lose the war.  Maintaining the support of the masses was a core value for the Nazis to attain and maintain their power, but if they lost the war, they would lose their power immediately.  These efforts to keep the masses happy were completely pointless and wasteful.  Goebbels proclaimed that he closed the theaters to put Germany on the track of “total war,” yet this obviously did not shut down the entertainment industry.  The film Kolberg began production in 1942 and was not released until 1945 (Thompson and Bordwell 274).  This film was the costliest of the Nazi cinema projects, and it was made at a time when Germany was losing the war and about to be defeated (Thompson and Bordwell 274).  Goebbels even diverted 200,000 troops from battle to be used in Kolberg's production (Thompson and Bordwell 274).  Overall, the Nazis wasted their resources on film and the arts during a critical time during the war when Germany could not afford it.

Thompson, Kristin, and David Bordwell. Film History An Introduction. 2nd. New York: McGraw Hill, 2003.

Miller. Peter. " Evil genius of Hitler's propaganda machine," Sunday Times (London) 05 Jul 1992. LexisNexis. 29 Nov 2008

      This article is about Joseph Goebbels and his pivotal role in the formation of Adolph Hitler’s status and power.  Goebbels was one of few individuals that realized early on the importance of the support of the masses in attaining power.  As minister of propaganda, Goebbels was in charge of making sure that the citizens perceived all information the way that the Nazi Party wanted them to.  While originally he was against Hitler, he soon recognized Hitler’s great oratory talents.  While Hitler was the orator that delivered the message to the German people, Goebbels was the one making sure that the content of the message was, indeed, the "proper" message to be relayed to the masses.  Goebbels utilized radio, television, and cinema to spread his propaganda.  He was very effective with this media and realized their importance in fostering public support. Through this manipulation of the public did Goebbels enable the Nazi Party to accomplish its many terrible deeds.  Goebbels was very committed to the Nazi cause and arguably was just as or even more important to many of its “accomplishments” than Hitler.  Like Hitler, Goebbels and his family also suffered a bloody fate.
     Goebbels realized that before the Nazi Party could gain power and take over the state, they had to win over the hearts and minds of the people.  Because of the importance of fostering the support of the masses, Goebbels placed such a great emphasis on propaganda.  His use of film allowed his propaganda to most effectively reach the masses. Film was the most influential medium for propaganda because it allowed for great subtlety in the portrayal of the message the Nazis wanted.  The importance of film as a tool for propaganda and Joseph Gobbels’ high priority of attaining the support of the German public as minister of propaganda led to an overemphasis of the value of film, specifically when he unwisely allocated an excessive amount of money and troops—much needed resources for the war—to the making of the film Kolberg.

Fritzsche, Peter. "Nazi Modern." Modernism/Modernity 3.11996 1-22. 1 Dec 2008 .

     The Nazis came to power because of the hopelessness of the German people due to the disastrous condition in which Germany was left following WWI. The people were not happy to see the Nazis in particular; they accepted them because they needed a change. The main goal of the Nazis was to exterminate the Jewish people, yet most Germans did not agree with this agenda.  The Nazis embraced technology and made Germany’s economy more industrialized and more technologically advanced.  Because of this some people, oversimplify the Nazis’ impact on Germany and say that they were modernizers.  The more complex view argues that Nazis were modernists.  As modernists, the Nazis sought racial purification in an attempt to unify and strengthen the German society so that it would be “strong and homogeneous enough to prosper in the dangerous era of world wars” (Fritzsche).  This racial purification in conjunction with increased social programs were measures to promote national health and were seen as modern ways to better German society.  In theory, these practices could have made German society very strong and unified, but these apparent benefits do not justify the mass murders that were made necessary to carry out the racial purification.  This racial purification, ultimately, destroyed German society because the wrath of the world for the murderous injustices Germany was committing.
    The initial background for the argument of this article is that the people were never won over by the Nazis.  This information offers a new perspective.  This lack of all out support by the people may be the reason that Goebbels and the Nazis were so concerned with maintaining public support.  If their support was a given, surely Goebbels would not have spent so many resources on propaganda like Kolberg.  The overarching goals of the Nazis for unity also explain why the public's consensus with the goals of the Nazi Party was so desirable.  In creating a unified German society, surely the Nazis not only wanted unification with race and appearance, but unification with the thoughts and minds of the German people.  The Nazis felt that this unification was key to strength in this dangerous world.  The Nazis' great desire to attain strength for the German society is explained by the way Germany was left crushed following WWI.  Overall, the desire for the unification of German society explains why such a high value was placed on propaganda and therefore, film, its most important medium.

Kracauer, Siegfried. From Caligari to Hitler, a psychological history of the German Film. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1947.

“Nazi Views And Measures”

    All films in Nazi Germany were propaganda films.  Newsreels and features were the two forms of propaganda.  Newsreels were a means of propaganda not information.  The purpose of newsreels was to give the German people skewed world views.  The production of newsreels greatly increased at the onset of WWII. While newsreels portrayed falsified messages, the scenes shown were never faked—they were always actual footage taken on site.  This element made these propaganda newsreels more believable.  The Nazis prided themselves on the fact that the cameramen for newsreels were like “regular soldiers, doing a soldier’s full duty, always in the first lines…” (Kracauer 276).  The deaths of these cameramen and reporters at the front lines were emphasized to the public to reiterate the fact that the reporters were, indeed, amongst the soldiers on the war front. These newsreels were considerably long, so that the propaganda techniques could be repeated for increased effectiveness.  While newsreels were long, unlike feature films, newsreels were produced rapidly so that the information was timely and viewed as actual news. 
    While in my thesis I use the broad term film, I only consider the term to describe feature films.  This chapter highlights the importance of the newsreel.  The newsreel is a form of film propaganda that I really should not have ignored.  Because of the newsreel’s entirely different nature, its inclusion would have given my thesis more depth.  The newsreel did not have the same production costs or length of time needed for production because all the footage is filmed live at the scene.  Considering these facts, newsreels as film propaganda were much more cost effective than feature films.  While newsreels directly told Germans what to believe, newsreels still were subtle forms of propaganda because they were being portrayed in documentary style as fact.  In my thesis I argued that film was overvalued by the Nazis at times because of its great cost when resources were needed badly for the war effort.  Newsreels, though, would have served as a good compromise. Still, though, when the situation with the war became very dire, resources should never have been diverted from the war effort.

David Welch’s article describes how the Nazis used propaganda to influence public opinion. He argues “the concept of a ‘national’ or ‘people’s’ community was a key element in the ‘revolutionary’ aims of the Nazi regime, and illustrates the remarkably ambitious nature of its propaganda.” He claims that German propaganda was ambitious because it attempted to unite the classes. The author also analyzes “two sections of the community- the industrial working class and German youth.” He believes that there is “considerable evidence to suggest that Nazi policies and propaganda reflected many of the aspirations of large sections of the population.” This argument continues as Welch says that propaganda is “as much about confirming rather than converting public opinion. Propaganda, if it is to be effective must, in a sense, preach to those who are already partially converted.” He points out that the “regime’s propaganda was pragmatic enough to recognize that its policies could be maintained provided section of the community who were opposed to Nazism remained quiescent.” He mentions that Nazi leaders such as Joseph Goebbels identified the importance of propaganda and attempted to utilize it to their advantage. Propaganda may have been effective in Germany because the country was suffering from national humiliation after World War I and was also was facing economic troubles. The propaganda also based on traditional German ideas, which included: an “appeal to national unity based on the principle: ‘The community before the individual,’ the need for racial purity,” and “charismatic leadership.” The purpose of Nazi propaganda was to radically “restructure German society so that the prevailing class, religious and sectional loyalties would be replaced by a new heightened national awareness.”
    This article gives an interesting viewpoint about the effects of propaganda as the author says that propaganda is more capable of confirming an opinion that already exists than completely altering a person’s perspective. This idea conflicts with Meaney’s article, which describes how propaganda can manipulate any person’s mindset. Yet, Welch’s argument is supported by some of the sources that describe the Disney Company, which claim that Disney based some of its cartoons on public opinion. Though the article uses Germany as an example, it tends to discuss propaganda mostly in general terms, so its arguments are applicable to my thesis.

This article explains why propaganda is such a powerful force and uses Germany as an example. The author thinks that propaganda is not a means of persuasion, but rather “an extension of the techniques of psychical coercion.” He incorporates ideas from Adolf Hitler, who tried to manipulate facts to control public opinion. Meaney investigates the way Hitler used propaganda and concludes that “terror used with suddenness can stampede the masses into a course of action; used over a prolonged period it can exhaust individuals psychologically and cause them to collapse and to yield.” In his argument, he also discusses modern advertising, which makes it easy to spread propaganda. With an example, he demonstrates “the full effect of concentrated propaganda on an individual, showing that a gradual, unconscious, involuntary, but nevertheless effective breaking down of the will’s latent opposition took place.”
    This article addresses the second part of my thesis as it explains the effects of propaganda. Though it focuses on German propaganda, which differed from American propaganda, the author discusses propaganda in general to show that it can be incredibly powerful. The example that Meaney uses demonstrates how any person can be manipulated by propaganda, so it seems as though the author would argue that Americans would have been greatly affected by cartoon propaganda during World War II if he were writing a paper with my thesis.