The Nazi Officer's Wife
by Liz Garbus
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DVD details
Actor: Edith Hahn Beer, Julia Ormond, Susan SarandonDirector: Liz Garbus
Cinematographer: Daniel B. Gold
Editor: Eric Seuel Davies
Producer: Christina Zilber
Producer: Jack Youngelson
Writer: Jack Youngelson
Producer: Julie Gaither
Producer: Laurent Zilber
Producer: Rory Kennedy
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Original Language)
Format: Black & White, Color, DVD-Video, NTSC
Picture Format: 1.33:1
Running Time: 90 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2003-07-29
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Studio: A&E Home Video
DVD Reviews of The Nazi Officer's Wife
DVD Review: an outstanding, fascinating documentary
Summary: 5 Stars
The Nazi Officer's Wife is a fine documentary that tells the completely true story of the lengths to which a young Jewish woman, Edith Hahn, went to survive Nazi occupation of Austria and Nazism in Germany during World War Two. As other reviewers have noted, this is not a motion picture with actors; instead we meet and get extensive interview time with Edith Hahn, the actual woman who lived through this horror. We also get good interview footage with her daughter and a couple of surviving friends from Edith's high school years as well. The documentary moves along at a good pace; and it kept my attention every step of the way. I liked the way they handled this topic; they were very sensitive and yet they never shied away from telling the truth. Susan Sarandon and Julia Ormond narrate at times to enhance the documentary.
Edith Hahn was born in Vienna, Austria; and she lived there with her family and her Christian boyfriend Pepi when the Nazis came to power in Germany. When the Nazis invaded Austria things almost immediately became impossible for Jews: Jewish children were banned from schools and Jews were beaten up on the street simply for being Jewish. You could have been beaten up just for "looking" Jewish! Edith's father had died two years prior to the Nazi invasion; and her sisters escape to Palestine. Unfortunately, however, Edith must go to a labor camp for thirteen months and toil from four in the morning until after sunset. Edith wrote many letters to Pepi who risked his own safety just keeping the letters; and when Edith returns to Vienna in Austria after thirteen months of hard labor she gets the crushing news that her mother was deported to a "camp."
Edith realizes she may never see her mother nor her sisters again--and so, with the aid of a lady who was an early member of the Nazi party (believe it or not) and a close family Christian friend (Cristl Denner) Edith finally gets false identification papers to "prove" she's an Aryan named Greta Denner. Edith bravely travels to Munich, falls in love with a man named Werner Vetter and they marry even after she tells Werner she is secretly Jewish. After Werner is drafted he eventually gets promoted to the position of Nazi officer--and this leaves the secretly Jewish Edith, masquerading as Greta Denner, the wife of a Nazi officer.
Believe it or not, there's plenty of the story left to tell. What happens after that? Does Edith ever get to be her own self again, or did she have to remain Greta Denner to save herself from even more anti-Semitism after the war was over? What about the daughter she has with Werner--will he like having a daughter that is part-Jewish? Werner knew Greta was secretly Jewish; but a partly Jewish daughter could be very different. Will Werner and Edith even stay together after the war? Watch and find out!
The DVD comes with no extras; but with the very rare footage we get of refugee camps after the war and those incredible still photos from before the war, this is no big problem.
The Nazi Officer's Wife tells the truth about how desperate people can take desperate measures to survive in a world gone mad. I highly recommend this documentary for people studying World War Two; and people studying Jewish culture would do well to get this documentary.
DVD Review: Nazi Officer's Wife
Summary: 5 Stars
This is a most close to actual facts and old film records of the time. Voice overs were terrific. Well done.DVD Review: Gripping, but incomplete
Summary: 4 Stars
Gripping documentary--not a feature film--for viewers who have had significant life experience; it may be a bit slow for some others.
Some subsidiary facts, like that Hahn's first lover Pepi eventually did marry and did not remain a mama's boy, or that her husband Vetter believed racial-purity dogma to his dying day, are left out. These must be gleaned from the Internet. It is a disappointment that no extras are offered.
Otherwise, an extremely worthwhile film that reminds us again how many amazing stories resulted from the combination of Hitler's insanity and the German psyche.
DVD Review: What some people do to survive can seem unbelievable
Summary: 5 Stars
Edith Hahn's true story is on par with a great companion film EUROPA EUROPA.Both films explore the strange circumstances that some Jews of the 1940's Holocaust found themselves facing in order to survive such madness.Like EUROPA EUROPA,THE NAZI OFFICER'S WIFE is a film that chronicles the almost happenstance life of one Jewish woman facing danger and strange,almost "Unseen" occurances at every turn.This is a thrilling film.Edith Hahn's story also highlights the ways in which many people worked WITHIN The Nazi Party in order to save countless lives.This is a point that i
s often overlooked in many Holocaust films.
The 2007 Dutch thriller BLACK BOOK bares amazing similarities to the Edith Hahn story, and may well be based upon her exploits.
DVD Review: Compelling Holocaust Film
Summary: 3 Stars
If you're expecting a movie which portrays the life of Edith Hahn, you're going to be disappointed. However, if you're expecting a documentary style film, you'll be happy with the results. Edith Hahn Beer's story is of the amazing true metamorphosis of a Jewish schoolgirl into an Aryan bride in a story unlike anyone else's. She got a job at the Red Cross and lived in a boarding house outside Munich. There she met Werner Vetter, a Nazi party member who fell in love with her. And despite her protests and even her eventual confession that she was Jewish, he married her and kept her identity secret. The two of them - the Nazi and his Jewish wife - lived out the war together, even bearing a child. Angela Vetter, their daughter is the only Jewish girl known to be born in a Nazi hospital. Throughout her ordeal, Edith saved every document and piece of paper issued to her, such as her Nazi identification, marriage certificate, and her daughter's birth certificate which listed both parents as "German-blooded." The film explores issues of faith, family and identity in this complex portrait of a woman who had to bury her true self in order to survive.
Description of The Nazi Officer's Wife
The most melodramatic Hollywood screenwriter could not concoct a tale as full of dramatic reversals, conflicted characters, and astounding coincidences as the story of Edith Hahn, an Austrian Jew who eluded Nazi oppression by going underground as an Aryan woman in the heart of Germany. When a Nazi factory manager named Vetter proposes to her after they've only known each other a few weeks, she confesses her true identity--and he marries her anyway. Her "U-boat" existence becomes an even more complicated masquerade when Vetter is drafted into the Nazi army and becomes an officer. The Nazi Officer's Wife lays out the story with clarity and compassion, with all its contradictions and glimpses of human goodness, in the face of monstrous evil, intact. The details of Hahn's life are simply amazing. Interviews with Hahn, her daughter, and other survivors give full dimension to the events. --Bret FetzerGeneral DVDs
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