The Eternal Jew” and its creator

By Paul R. Bartrop, PhD

“The Eternal Jew” was one of the most notorious of all anti-Jewish propaganda movies ever made. Exactly 80 years ago this month, on November 28, 1940, the 65-minute-long movie premiered in Berlin.

Its director was Fritz Hippler, a German filmmaker who ran the film department in the Propaganda Ministry of Joseph Goebbels. Born on August 17, 1909, he was brought up in Berlin. In 1927, he joined the Nazi Party, became a law student at universities in Heidelberg and Berlin, and by 1934, had earned his PhD.

In 1932, he became a Nazi Party district speaker and was promptly expelled from the University of Berlin for inciting violence. On April 19, 1933, however, the Nazi education minister, Bernhard Rust, overthrew all existing disciplinary actions against students associated with the Nazi Party, enabling Hippler’s return. He then became the district and high school group leader for Berlin-Brandenburg in the National Socialist German Students’ League. On May 22, 1933, he led his fellow students in a march from the student house to Opera Square, with a collection of banned books, which were then publicly burned.

In 1936, Hippler became an assistant to the artist, photographer and film director, Hans Weidemann. In this capacity, he worked on the production of newsreels and learned the techniques behind documentary filmmaking. In January 1939, he took over Weidemann’s position, meaning that he now worked directly for Goebbels, and by August 1939, he had been promoted to head the film departDr. Paul Bartrop ment. Among his tasks, he regulated which foreign films would be allowed on German screens and what parts of them would be cut.

He also produced movies of his own. In 1940, he directed “Der Feldzug in Poland (The Campaign in Poland),” a propaganda film demonstrating the superiority of German arms in the first phase of World War II from September 1939 onwards.

His most famous — indeed, infamous — creative work was undoubtedly “Der Ewige Jude (The Eternal Jew).” The film consisted of documentary footage combined with materials filmed shortly after the Nazi occupation of Poland. Hippler shot footage in the Jewish ghettos of Łódz, Warsaw, Kraków and Lublin, the only such footage, as it turned out, shot specifically for the film. The rest of the film consisted of stills and archival material from other feature films — footage that was presented as if it was additional documentary film. The film itself covered four essential tropes: “degenerate” Jewish life as seen in the Polish ghettos; the nature of Jewish political, cultural and social values; Jewish religious ceremonies, instruction, worship and ritual slaughter; and Adolf Hitler as the savior of Germany.

While the intention of the film was to prepare the German population for the coming Holocaust (even though the Nazis had not themselves yet decided on mass annihilation as the means to destroy Europe’s Jews), the movie did not have the desired impact on the German public, owing to the fact that a major motion picture, “Jud Süss” (directed by Veit Harlan, 1940), had already appeared to rapturous acclaim, employing top box office stars and building on a captivating period drama. By contrast, “The Eternal Jew” was a documentary based on limited original footage, still images and archival film clips.

Unlike “Jud Süss,” therefore, which was a great commercial success, “Der Ewige Jude” was something of a failure at the box office. As a propaganda film, it would be shown repeatedly for training purposes to troops fighting on the Eastern Front as well as members of the SS, while a number of foreign language voiceovers were made and the film was exported to countries occupied by Germany.

Hippler, for his part, was honored by Adolf Hitler for making the movie. In October 1942, he was given responsibility for the control, supervision and direction of all German movies, making him second only to Goebbels.

Such a career trajectory, though impressive, generated resentment in some quarters — no less than from Goebbels himself. He had long kept a watching brief on Hippler, who he saw as sometimes impertinent, often immature, disorganized and too fond of alcohol. In June 1943, Goebbels finally dismissed him. Hippler was stripped of his SS rank and a trumped-up accusation was brought against him of having denied that he had a Jewish great-grandmother. He was sent to an infantry replacement battalion and underwent mountain infantry training. Released from active duty, he was then given the task of shooting newsreel footage as a cameraman until February 1945. At the end of the war, he was taken by the British as a prisoner of war.

In 1946, he was tried for directing “Der Ewige Jude” and sentenced to two years in prison. Staging a comeback after his release, he collaborated on documentary movies under another name. In a 1981 memoir, he claimed that Goebbels was the real creator of “Der Ewige Jude,” having directed large parts of it himself and giving Hippler the credit. Later, he stated that he regretted being listed as the director of the movie because it unfairly resulted in his treatment after the war.

In his opinion, he had nothing to do with the killing of Jews, and only shot some footage for a film that Goebbels himself then put together. He claimed further that, at the time, he had little knowledge of the Nazis’ murderous policies towards the Jews and was not aware of the Holocaust as it was taking place. If he was given the chance, he said, he would “annul” everything about the film, which had caused him such personal difficulties in his subsequent life.

Fritz Hippler lived in Berchtesgaden, Bavaria, until his death on May 22, 2002, age 92.