By the way, the movie "Downfall" (or "Der Untergang") is an absolutely brilliant film about the final days of Hitler's life, the last couple of weeks in the Berlin Bunker, and the other people who were around him.

It is excerpts from that film which are being used for those parodies. Bruno Ganz did such a marvelous portrayal of Hitler that you can hardly believe he isn't Hitler.

This movie was made in modern Germany, one of the most anti-Nazi societies on Earth, and it was done because people there wish to face what happened honestly, process it emotionally, and thereby clear the pain of it from their souls. It was a time of incredible disaster and tragedy for millions of people. The movie is fair and realistic. It shows the top Nazis and the General Staff who were around Hitler in a realistic way, both the fanatical believers and the many others who were just soldiers or civilians trying desperately to survive and to do their jobs in the midst of chaos and destruction.

Anyone could learn something useful about humanity, both their dark side and their kinder side, from watching that movie if they could do so without lapsing into their favorite reflex hatreds.

It's not cheerful. But it is a brilliant piece of historical filmmaking. One thing you have to realize when you watch it is: this could happen ANYwhere. It's not limited to Naziism. It's not limited to Germans. Any country can slide into a crazy political system and find itself in a terrible lost war. And if so...a lot of ordinary people will get hurt, and most of them will just be people like you or me who were in the wrong place at the wrong time.