User Reviews

"Hamburger Gitter" is a new 2018 film from Germany that runs for about 75 minutes only and focuses on the G20 summit in Germany pretty much exactly one year ago in summer 2017. It's basically a mix of interviews and footage from this highly controversial meeting of high-profile politicians in the German city of Hamburg. The subject could have been the basis for a really good documentary in my opinion, but the outcome is a massive disappointment and almost an insult to all honest and upright documentary filmmakers on the planet. The explanation is very simple. It is never a subjective documentary, never unbiased, frequently not even fact-based. Half of the interviewees make statements that are opinions, interpretations, at times even far away from the truth. Neutrality is missing altogether in here. So eventually, it is up to you which statements and consequences you believe to be accurate: those by very biased (frequently left-wing) participants or those by police officals and the German court system. For me the answer is obvious. And the execution here is not helping at all. The very early very generic anti-Trump/anti-Erdogan message is almost too obvious, but of course it will have a great impact on the easily influenced. Really their security are the only ones in danger of shooting anybody down? Typical stuff really as these two have been dealt with in the media for years as basically the scapegoats for everything going wrong in the world, rarely with factual evidence. But yeah, this is another subject. Lets go back to this film here. What you make of statements like those complaining about police officers's alleged comments that they threaten to perform sexual activities on the demonstrators' faces is up to you. Of course, they also included unfounded accusations of inappropriate sexually offensive behavior towards females by police officers. Where is the argument "innocent until proven guilty" that is listed on several other occasions when it comes to speaking positively about the demonstrators? Anyway, one aspect I really want to emphasize here is the statement early on that everybody who demonstrates in a certain area, a certain radius of several kilometers during the summit, is breaking the law is extremely crucial here. This means everybody there was breaking the law and they should be thankful instead that they did not get arrested right away. You commit a crime, you need to accept that police will search your apartment or your room at your parents' house and not react like a crybaby half your age. Another really insulting aspect here was that really all the comments they took from police representatives were those that added nothing positive for them and I am sure those statements that really made a difference had been left out intentionally. Instead, the (extreme) left-wing demonstrators get all the screen time where they pose as victims by the police. I can only shake my head at that. Early on there was a comment about how people were scared to go there because of police violence, but I doubt that. those who were not 100% dedicated to their cause did not go there because they were scared to get mixed up in police officers reacting to left-wing violence. If anybody stayed at home at all, that is. The number speaks a clear language I would say. What else can I add? Oh yes, there is not one occasion where we hear interviewees speak in an unbiased manner of the excellent job police did so many times during this summit, namely to make sure nobody dies and to make sure less people than expected got injured. Sometimes violence is inevitable in order to avoid a higher degree of violence, perhaps lethal one even and this was the case here for sure. I applaud the police for the job they did back then. This "documentary" does not even come close to depicting things the way they actually were there. And guess what. If you complain about police hiding their faces behind masks, then you can impossibly be serious looking at the exaggerated deal of mummery going on with all the demonstrants. So is this a good film we have here? Not at all. But still it deserves to be seen in order to understand propaganda in the media in the 21st century that could not be any further away from the truth. And the sad thing is how many people are falling for it. If showing badass cops evokes laughter in the audience and if people applaud after this film, then the makers have got something right, even if it is in the most simple, still the most despicable way imaginable. Luckily, it is such a short film at easily under 1.5 hours.An important film to watch in order to see and understand the concept of manipulative propaganda. Finally, one note on the dedication of the people who made this movie here and their attention to detail. If they do not even manage to get the spelling right when it comes to the (actually really good) music title that plays during the closing credits, then that basically says it all how fit they are in their profession.