November 5 movie: Tomorrow, the World! This was the second worst movie I saw last weekend. It was about an American family, headed by Fredric March, who adopt a German boy during the war. (I missed the first few minutes so I don't know how the boy got to the US.) The boy is a vicious little Hitler Youth; before the movie is over he beats up the other kids; finds out that one girl's father is in a prisoner of war camp in Germany and threatens to have her father killed; writes anti-semitic messages outside the school about his Jewish teacher (who's also March's fiancee); tries to steal state secrets from March; and when his adoptive sister catches him in the act, brains her with a fireplace poker & nearly kills her.
March calls the police on the little Nazi, but the teacher tells the boy how since he has no friends, his adoptive sister planned his birthday party, paid the other kids to come and bought all the presents, including borrowing a year's allowance to get him the night-vision watch he wanted. The kid breaks down and cries, so they decide he's human after all and he can stay with them.
This movie was made during the war, but I think after the tide had turned for the Allies. Everyone in the movie seems to have known that we were going to win. March talks several times about the German kid being a test case for how to deal with Germany after the war: if they can get through to the Hitler Youth kid, then they can get through to the German people. The message seems to be that the German people were monsters, but if we went into hock to buy them friends and nice things, they'd see the error of their ways. As Georg said, that's the Marshall Plan right there.
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