I find this film to be remarkable in its ability to arouse a racist response in viewing it, to the degree that it is to some extent worth studying to see what techniques make this possible. From my perspective, as someone in the U.S., the anti-Gypsy sentiment in Europe is something alien; here, Gypsies may be presented as something of a fairy-tale concept, but I've never encountered any real sense of animosity toward them. But this presentation makes it feel very real - my feeling is, if you're not feeling by the end that those poor victims should shout out at their persecutors that the next time the Nazies are going to finish the job, you're not getting into the film. And of course, that's disturbing.
Some of the techniques are obvious - the freaky appearance of some of the characters, the lovely white woman tied up as a sacrifice, the constant cheating. The way the Gypsies always and automatically side with each other, and above all, the sense that the innocent non-Gypsy bystander, and by extension, yourself, merely riding in the RV, becomes the victim of their murderous and unnatural wrath, and has no choice but to take up arms against them in a war of extermination which, one feels, should and must proceed until the last spawn of their clan has been strangled in its cradle. But I think for every technique I understand, there must be two I haven't apprehended.
As a movie, it is not much, but as a sort of "Birth of a Nation" style propaganda, it is dangerously outstanding.
Some of the techniques are obvious - the freaky appearance of some of the characters, the lovely white woman tied up as a sacrifice, the constant cheating. The way the Gypsies always and automatically side with each other, and above all, the sense that the innocent non-Gypsy bystander, and by extension, yourself, merely riding in the RV, becomes the victim of their murderous and unnatural wrath, and has no choice but to take up arms against them in a war of extermination which, one feels, should and must proceed until the last spawn of their clan has been strangled in its cradle. But I think for every technique I understand, there must be two I haven't apprehended.
As a movie, it is not much, but as a sort of "Birth of a Nation" style propaganda, it is dangerously outstanding.