# OMG yet another Hitler documentary...



## Venusian Broon (Oct 20, 2014)

Rant on!

Just to set the scene, last night Channel 4 here in the UK showed _Hitler's Hidden Drug Habit - _a one hour documentary focusing more or less on showing that Hitler was a crystal meth user. Oh and he ate pills derived from the poo of German soldiers.

Yes he's important to study, it important for all of us to remember what happened so that it does not happen again...but this obsession with revealing every _single_ fact about him is getting _ridiculous_. Just off the top of my head we've had documentaries on: the secret psychological profiling dossier that US intelligence did on him, Hitler's Will, How SOE might have assassinated him, a whole _series _on his bodyguards and security arrangements, someone trying to find his DNA, Hitler and the Spear of Destiny etc...

We have excellent documentaries such as The Nazis: A warning from History and Auschwitz: The Nazis and the final solutions and I'm not sure knowing that Hitler had chronic flatulence, was probably suffering massively from stress and the colour and constancy of his stool really adds much.

Anyway rant over...



I watched it and it was ok-ish, 5/10.




Oh on a related note on More 4 on the Nazi Mega-structures series is that not the _worst_ ever TV Hitler look alike. He reminds me of a chuckle brother.


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## Foxbat (Oct 20, 2014)

It seems to me that somebody thinks showing anything about Hitler and the Nazis will get viewing figures up and it doesn't matter if it's historically pointless.


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## HareBrain (Oct 20, 2014)

I'm not sure that was historically pointless though, if it's true that Hitler's Parkinson's disease might have had a major impact on how he conducted the latter part of the war.

(Of course that might have been known/speculated for ages, but it was news to me. Also note I only saw the last five minutes.)


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## Venusian Broon (Oct 20, 2014)

HareBrain said:


> I'm not sure that was historically pointless though, if it's true that Hitler's Parkinson's disease might have had a major impact on how he conducted the latter part of the war.
> 
> (Of course that might have been known/speculated for ages, but it was news to me. Also note I only saw the last five minutes.)



I think it has been known for a while, at least in historical circles, Ian Kershaw in his monumental work, _Hitler: Nemesis_  (well part 2 of the total work, the other being _Hubris_) basically summaries the entire amount of 'new' knowledge that was in the documentary in one paragraph. He states that he probably suffered from Parkinson's there. That was published in 2000. So I expect he knew that a while before. 

Excellent books as well - exhaustive, (ok perhaps a little _too _exhaustive for the casual reader ), in discussing Hitler the person in terms of proper history.


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## HareBrain (Oct 20, 2014)

Venusian Broon said:


> basically summaries the entire amount of 'new' knowledge that was in the documentary in one paragraph.



Substitute "any" for "new" and you could do the same with 99% of Channel 4 documentaries.


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## Venusian Broon (Oct 20, 2014)

I suppose it's pretty easy and dirt cheap to make a documentary on Hitler - no issues about slander, lots of stock historical footage to choose from: goose-stepping soldiers, Nazi cronies, tanks rolling across the landscape, the Hitler's entertaining at the Berghof, artillery being fired, burnt out cities, bombs being dropped, refugees etc...and then the occasional talking head of an expert. Splash on oodles of ominous music and pay for a nice voice to speak the script.


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## BAYLOR (Oct 20, 2014)

HareBrain said:


> I'm not sure that was historically pointless though, if it's true that Hitler's Parkinson's disease might have had a major impact on how he conducted the latter part of the war.
> 
> (Of course that might have been known/speculated for ages, but it was news to me. Also note I only saw the last five minutes.)




Wasn't there  speculation that Hitler may have had Syphilis too?


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