TWISTED SINEMA YELLOW JOURNAL

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by: [SPECIAL GUEST COLUMNIST] REG HARTT!!!
Subject: Are you a Jew?
The first time I showed Leni Riefenstahl's film of Hitler's 1934 Nuremberg
rally, TRIUMPH OF THE WILL, I got the shock of my life. The place was packed. As
Hitler stepped off the plane to cries of "Hail Victory" from hundreds of
thousands of Nurembergers a large number of the audience (not the majority)
stood up and gave the Nazi salute. The biggest ones were back by where I was
with the projector. I knew that if I stopped the film there would be a riot. I
also knew that no one in the audience would stand with me. I let the moment
pass. I had learned, however, that Nazism is a corpse that will not stay buried.
Determined that would never happen again the next time I showed the film I spoke
in front of it. Film buffs complained they had come to see a movie not to
listen to a speech. Others said, "What are your credits? By what authority do
you speak to us? Why should we listen to you?" Then I found out that the word on
the street was that I, myself, am a Nazi. No one who came to a presentation
would say that but these people were not interested in discovering the truth.
They were just gossips doing what gossips always do. In many of these e-mails I
have expressed my contempt for our education system. One of the people who came
to my screening of TRIUMPH OF THE WILL is Jane Jacobs. Her books and ideas have
shaped the world we live in. In an interview Mrs. Jacobs said, "I had great
teachers in the first and second grades who taught me everything I know. After
that the teachers were nice but they were dumb." And there we have it, nice but
dumb. The dumb beget the dumb. Teachers have told their students not to come to
my presentation or to come an hour late so that they will not have to hear me.
"We don't want our students' minds colored by what you have to say. You do not
have academic credentials. You have no right to present yourself as an
authority," I have been told. I have never presented myself as an authority. I
have always been a voice crying in the wilderness. On one occasion, at The
Spadina Hotel, there was a riot at my presentation of this film. On the ad it
had said that I would speak for an hour. "We did not come here to hear you,"
said some. One man said, "If you do not shut up I will use the power of the
press to destroy you." I told him bluntly he was not welcome at my presentation.
I felt a sharp pain in my crotch. When I got home and went to the bathroom I
discovered my cock was purple. I went to the hospital and had myself examined.
"Well, if you are going to show that film you have to expect actions like this,"
said the doctor who examined me. "I know. I do. I am just having myself
examined by you so that there is a record of the assault on my person." Then I
found myself charged with assault. Friends recommended a politically correct
lawyer. The problem with a politically correct lawyer, at least with the one I
had, is that he is more concerned with being politically correct than with
winning his case. The judge said he could not accept the evidence of the assault
on my person because it had not been presented to the court prior to the trial.
It was then I discovered our justice system is not about justice but about the
system. When the man who had threatened to use the power of press to destroy me
had uttered his threat I replied, "You do your worst. I will do my best. When
you are done I will be here." The judge told me, "Son, I have no choice in this
matter. I have to find you guilty." "I know," I told him. "Then I am giving you
an absolute discharge," the judge replied. We live in a time beguiled by things.
We dream of magic swords not realizing the power lies not in the sword but in
the hand that holds the sword. "Are you a Jew?" one man asked as I was
introducing this film. I am not but I said, "Yes." "I KNEW IT!" he said and then
he unleashed a torrent of vile bile. As he did so I stood and smiled. The place
was packed. "How could you just stand there and smile while he heaped all that
abuse on you," people asked after. "You were not seeing what I was seeing," I
told them. "What were you seeing," they asked. "I was seeing his son do his
best, without moving from his seat, to distance himself from his father. In the
few moments his father unleashed that poison he was doing more to separate his
son from the bigotry of the past than I could have done in a thousand years." I
have been showing this film for over twenty-five years. In that time I have met
many people who were witnesses to Hitler. One woman came to see the film
eighteen times. I asked her, at last, asked her why she was coming so often. "I
am in it," she told me. "You are in it?" "Yes," she told me. I then found out
she had been a small child in Nuremberg when all this happened. The first time
she came she had seen herself, her father, her mother, her brothers, her
sisters, leaning out of a window waving Nazi flags as Adolf Hilter passed by.
She was a Jew. Her family were Jews. Jews were waving Nazi flags. Of course,
they, too, had had hope in Hitler I realized. Her family had found, as Germany
was to find, that that hope was false. They had all died in what our lovely
Ernst Zundel says did not happen. They had met their ends in Hitler's ovens.
She had no pictures of them. The only pictures she had were these flashing
images on my screen. After she left I thought of offering to have that frame
enlarged so she could have it. She never came back. But many more did. Just
recently a man told me, "I celebrated my 17th birthday in Dachau." From such a
man we can learn a lot. Maybe not you as most of you are just passing through.
I, however, am here. When I meet someone like that I invite him/her to speak to
me. And I listen. Later I share with those who come what I have learned from
those who came. Bernie Farber, of the Candian Jewish Congress, was quoted in the
St. John, New Brunswick TELEGRAPH JOURNAL, saying that this presentation is
educational and that these are things that have to be studied. Jane Jacobs wrote
that seeing this presentation, with my commentary, is like getting an
inoculation against mass media manipulation. And she described that commentary
as excellent. You won't find the TORONTO STAR's film writers in my audience. You
won't find the film writers from THE GLOBE AND MAIL, THE NATIONAL POST nor the
film critics of the media in my audience. You won't find THE TORONTO FILM
SOCIETY members here. You won't find me invited to speak at their events. You
won't find me invited to speak at Cinematheque Ontario. In fact many of the
media writers I sent these missives have asked not to have them sent. The words
they have contempt for Mrs. Jacobs thanks me for delivering. She does not have a
computer. I give her a print out. "The most interesting part of your programs is
always what you have to say," she told me the other day. "We don't want our
students to hear you," teachers from universities, schools and colleges tell me
when they ask if they can show this film to their class and I say, "Not without
me." This is how it has always been. I am not complaining. I should not expect
those for whom I have contempt not to have contempt for me. The most wonderful
things happen, though and they make the price one well paid. You see as I walk
the streets posting flyers for these programs people come up to me who have been
to these programs. "Thank you," they say. One fellow who was homeless when I
gave him a place to get his feet planted told me that he had been caught up in
the Zundel brigade. "They sent us to see TRIUMPH OF THE WILL at your
presentation. After awhile they stopped sending us because they were losing so
many as a result of their seeing and hearing you." I don't give a fig in Hell
that film buffs, film critics and film makers shun my presentations. These
people are just diletantes. When the going gets rough they don't get tough they
just get out where they won't be harmed. In doing so they harm themselves. Words
not backed up with our lives are just empty cups. No, I am not a Jew. I am,
however, proud to be numbered with the Jews. I have been called, in TORONTO
LIFE, the most hated man in film in Canada. Throughout time the Jews have been
the most hated people on earth. There is a great strength that comes from being
numbered with those for whom the world has nothing but contempt. I invite you to
join me. No one who wants to build muscles lifts feathers. Best, Reg Hartt. P.S.
TRIUMPH OF THE WILL will be screened Sunday, APRIL 16th at 2pm at The Cineforum,
463 Bathurst Street, Toronto, 416-603-6643. All are welcome. The most expecially
welcome are those strong enough to stand with the damned.[1PM:ANTI-NAZI
CARTOONS5PM CHARLIE CHAPLIN'S STUDENT FILMS:16mm PRINTS, MADE BETWEEN 1914 TO
19177PM PHANTOM OF THE OPERA[1925]Lon Chaney...The Classic horror made with a
special musical score by Reg
Hartt.--------------------------------------------------------------------------\
-----TORONTO'S CINEFORUM 416-603-6643SEE YA AT THE MOVIES!


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