Christian Love Messages
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Conspiracy (2001)
By the winter of 1942, Hitler’s dream of Aryan supremacy had become a nightmare. His armies could be found freezing and starving on the Eastern front, and America’s fighting forces had just entered the war to the West.
On January 20th of that year, 15 officials attended a conference at Wannsee on the outskirts of Berlin. Comprised of mid-ranking SS commanders and a variety of government ministers, the meeting was organized by SS Major Adolf Eichman, under the direction of the ruthless and efficient Chief of Security Reinhard Heydrich.
It was to be a polite conference with food, wine and some debate, but beneath this thin veneer of manners lay an evil intent. By the meeting’s close, the fate of six million lives would be decided, and a terrible machine put into operation that would alter the shape of the world. Conspiracy is based on the only surviving record of that meeting. It would be the blueprint for Hitler’s “final solution.”
Customer Review: Â The impact of CONSPIRACY derives from the chilling ordinariness of the conference and its tone. These fifteen might just as well be the top management of a large corporation discussing the eradication of rats from one of its manufacturing sites, or the construction of an assembly line to produce more and better widgets. As a note of interest, nine of those present were lawyers by training.
Branagh renders a positively brilliant performance as the ultimate devil’s advocate, who steers the meeting to its foregone conclusion with a mixture of charm and quiet menace. When Kritzinger (David Threfall) objects that Hitler has declared to him personally that execution of the Jews is not his intent, Heydrich cooly reminds him, “Yes, and he will continue to do so.” Plausible deniability, you see. And later in a private conversation when Heydrich demands Kritzinger’s full support, the SS General remarks that the latter would be a difficult man to bring down – but it could be managed.