Veit Harlan

He became Catholic two months before his death.

Uncle of Christiane Kubrick and Jan Harlan.

After Adolf Hitler came to power, Harlan--unlike many German film directors--stayed in Germany. He embraced the new Nazi regime and directed several pro-Nazi propaganda films for the new government, with his wife Kristina Sderbaum in the main parts. Considered to be the worst of these was the universally reviled Jud S , a virulent anti-Semitic propaganda piece masquerading as a period piece melodrama. After the war Harlan was charged with crimes against humanity because of this film, but in 1950, after several court trials, was let go.

Father of Thomas Harlan.

After studying under Max Reinhardt , he first appeared on stage in 1915.

Died during holiday on the Italian island of Capri.

Claimed the Nazis forced him to shoot propaganda movies such as Jud S , although many former crew members and colleagues contradicted him.

His first wife, Dora Gerson , was Jewish and was killed in Auschwitz in 1943.

The documentary Harlan - In the Shadow of Jew Sss by Felix Moeller explores Harlans motivations and the post-war reaction of his children and grandchildren to his notoriety.

Today Veit Harlan is connected to his propaganda movies he made during World War II by the majority but this would be a one-dimensional view of his work.

Veit Harlan found out his interest into the acting in his school time and he began as an extra at the "Deutsches Theater". At the beginning of the 20s he got bigger parts at the theater and soon became established as an actor.

Thomas Harlans final publication, issued posthumously, Veit, was a memoir in the form of a letter to his father, continuing the investigation into Veit Harlans complicity in the Nazi regime.

His son Thomas Harlan became a director, his daughter Maria Krber an actress.

In 1958, Veit Harlans niece, Christiane Susanne Harlan, married filmmaker Stanley Kubrick, who was Jewish. She is credited by her stage name "Susanne Christian" in Kubricks Paths of Glory. They remained married until Stanley Kubricks death in 1999.

By 1937, Joseph Goebbels had appointed Harlan as one of his leading propaganda directors.

In 1951, Harlan sued for an injunction against Hamburg politician Erich Lth for publicly calling for a boycott of Unsterbliche Geliebte (Immortal Beloved). The District Court in Hamburg granted Harlans suit and ordered that Lth forbear from making such public appeals. However, the lower court decision was ultimately overturned in 1958 by the Federal Constitutional Court because it infringed on Lths right to freedom of expression. This was a landmark decision because it clarified the importance of the constitutional civil rights in disputes between individuals.

After the war Harlan was charged with participating in the anti-Semitic movement and aiding the Nazis. But he successfully defended himself by arguing that the Nazis controlled his work and that he should not be held personally responsible for its content.

Karsten Witte, the film critic, provided a fitting appellation for Harlan calling him "the baroque fascist". Harlan made the Reichs loudest, most colorful and expensive films.

In the sound film era he impersonated normally bigger support roles but he wasnt an actor star in the true sense of the word.

In 1949, Harlan was charged with crimes against humanity for his role as director of Jud S. The Hamburg Criminal Chamber of the Regional Court (Schwurgericht) acquitted Harlan of the charges; however, the court of the British occupation zone nullified the acquittal.

Film critic David Thomson asserts that Harlan, having just started directing in 1935, was only able to attract Goebbels attention because so much directorial talent had emigrated from Germany after the Nazis had taken power.

The actor and director Veit Harlan was and has been a very controversial person, not so much because of his movies as an actor but his movies as a director he created during World War II. They often had clear propagandist contents.

Veit Harlan, who was a professed National Socialist since 1933, recommended himself to the propaganda ministry with his movie "Der Herrscher".

After the war Veit Harlan was exposed to a vehement critic because of his propaganda movies, a petition for denazification remained unfinished. It followed two trials because of "crime against humanity", but Veit Harlan acquitted in both cases.

In 1935 he stopped acting and became a director.

Veit Harlans son Thomas (1929-2010), an author and film director, created a semi-documentary film called Wundkanal (Wound Passage), in which his father, played by a convicted mass murderer, is forced to undergo a series of brutal interrogations into his war crimes.

Susanne Krber, one of his daughters from his second wife Hilde Krber, converted to Judaism and married the son of Holocaust victims. She committed suicide in 1989.

His most notorious film was Jud S , which was made for anti-Semitic propaganda purposes in Germany and Austria. In 1943 it received UFAs highest awards.