DOWNFALL - Yours or Mine?

Neither!
It’s the title of a 2004 German historical war drama depicting the final days of Adolph Hitler (portrayed brilliantly by Bruno Ganz), nominated for Best Foreign Language film at the 77th Academy Awards.

The screenplay was based on two books: Inside Hitler’s Bunker by historian Joachim Fest and Until the Final Hour by Traudl Junge, one of Hitler’s secretaries.

What the hell provoked me to watch this movie about the final days of Hitler and his Nazi cronies?

Times like these, I need an upfall, not a downfall.

Much as I like quoting my favorite best friend, Voltaire… “History doesn’t repeat itself. People do.”...and leave it at that, I can’t. There are too many articles and books and videos that indicate the similarities between the 1930-1945 Nazi regime, ICE is a particularly heinous example, and our present administration.

So I watched the movie.

It is not an easy watch. Not just because I am a Jew. I was surprised by the many grey areas of life that exist within my usual black-and-white, judgmental self.

Maybe this movie has a moral warning for the terrible cast of characters who exist today in our own horror movie. Something terrible happens to terrible people who do terrible things.

Except for all those Nazis who got a free ride after the war.

Or maybe this movie illustrates that though these Nazi monsters almost succeeded in conquering the world, they failed, thanks and praise be to God, and their death was the price they paid.

Except for all those Nazis who got a free ride after the war.

Hitler was definitely Abby Normal. He and Eva Braun, his new bride, took a bite of cyanide, then he shot her, then himself, then ordered their bodies burned. He was heartbroken because the German people failed him.

His Nazi cronies followed suit, choosing a bite of cyanide or a bullet. They were heartbroken because they had failed their Führer. Next to Mr. and Mrs. Goebbels, all of the above were pussy cats.

As parents, they plot, plan, and carry out the murder of their six children, followed by Mr. Goebbels shooting Mrs. Goebbels, followed by Mr. Goebbels shooting himself, followed by bodies burning.

Yes, folks, I can safely say without fear of contradiction that to join the Nazi party, you needed a swastika, a truncheon, and a screw loose.

In the present day, in this administration, you don’t have to travel far to find similarities. This one is nuts, that one is crazy, and the redhead at the top is nuts, crazy, and suffering from dementia.

Now what?
(By the way, I’m thinking of that as the title for my next book… watcha think???)

I cannot wrap my headball around it all.

Of course, there are the usual suspects; the internet, the internet, and let’s not forget, the internet. Then there are the Zealots. Can’t have a party without zealots. In any society at any time, a new party needs a few zealots to stir the pot of anxiety and make mischief. However, will someone explain to me how ordinary people like you and me became involved with a bunch of crazy zealots? How did we end up supporting, no less voting for, obsessive, fanatical extremists? And if you didn’t actually vote or support them, you damn well know someone you like or love or live with who did.

Bob Fosse, the award-winning choreographer/director, illustrated this “accidental alignment” brilliantly and terrifyingly in the movie Cabaret.

Scary…so scary.

Does it all boil down to the human condition?

Are we doomed, as my buddy Voltaire wrote, to keep repeating ourselves? When I was a kid, I was a biter. In anger and frustration, my teeth were my weapon of choice. I am grateful I grew out of that very bad habit until… one day during a particularly volatile and emotionally frustrating argument with my at-the-time amorata, I bit him. I was so horrified. I immediately called my therapist. I told her what I did. I’ll never forget what she said to me, “Stop biting!”

O.K., friends, neighbors, countrymen and women, lend me your ears. Get off your ass, join others in an eyeball-to-eyeball community. Stop scrolling. Stop checking your texts and emails. Get off the internet, at least for a little while (I realize it’s myself that needs these admonitions the most)!

But whatever you do, stop biting!

Right???
Of course, right!!!

Love, Sally-Jane

P.S. Hey, I don’t know about you guys, but on July 4, 2026, I am going to celebrate 250 years of an imperfect but one-of-a-kind United States of America.

Sing along with me and see if we don’t start popping a few proud buttons and keep the light of liberty lit a little more brightly.

P.P.S. I want to suggest another movie. King of Hearts, with Alan Bates and Geneviève Bujold, an off-the-wall 1966 anti-war film in which the lunatics leave the asylum until they realize the real world is filled with crazier people.