Forbidden Films
Directed by Felix Moeller
1,200 feature films were made in Germany’s Third Reich. According to experts, some 100 of these were blatant Nazi propaganda. Nearly seventy years after the end of the Nazi regime, more than 40 of these films remain under lock and key. Director Felix Moeller (Harlan: In the Shadow of Jew Süss) interviews German film historians, archivists and filmgoers in an investigation of the power, and potential danger, of cinema when used for ideological purposes. Utilizing clips from the films and recorded discussions from public screenings (permitted in Germany in educational contexts) in Munich, Berlin, Paris and Jerusalem, Moeller shows how contentious these 70-year-old films remain, and how propaganda can retain its punch when presented to audiences susceptible to manipulation. —Telluride Film Festival
Read Richard Brody in The New Yorker on “The Virtues of Screening ‘Forbidden’ Films”
Read J. Hoberman in The New York Times: “‘Forbidden Films’ Exhumes Nazi Poison From the Movie Vaults”
FORBIDDEN FILMS opened in New York on May 13, 2015 and is now available on iTunes and for educational purchase and rental.
Reviews
COMPELLING. Fascinating viewing for both film and history buffs.
Timely and even vital...a thoughtful and sensitive addition to the debate surrounding censorship that continues to complicate our ideas concerning freedom and self-expression in the modern world.
Must-see viewing for cinephiles of all persuasions.
A documentary fascinated with and fearful of cinema’s potency.
