In fact, it looks like the National Socialist Party may have pioneered the technology that we know and sort-of like today.
Godwin’s Law states that, “As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches 1.” That is to say that any time people get in a heated discussion, eventually one of them will compare the views of the other to the Nazis.
This law has proven true on instance over instance, and has since carried over into all forms of communication, including TV news. Even in politics, our leaders can’t help but compare the views of those they oppose to the man generally agreed to be the worst person ever. Or at least the worst person in recent memory.
Discussions of 3D technology have been missing that special touch up until now. The argument, “Yeah, well ‘Avatar’ would have been Hitler’s favorite movie,” just doesn’t carry much weight. It seemed like Godwin’s Law was on the brink of being disproven.
As it turns out, this is no longer the case, thanks to Australian filmmaker Philippe Mora. He says that he’s discovered a pair of 3D movies made by the Nazis that predate the use of the technology outside Germany by years.
The first film is titled ‘So Real You Can Touch It’, and sounds more like a tech-demo than an actual movie. It features, for example, close-up shots of bratwurst being cooked. The second, which has a title that sounds equally dirty, is called ‘Six Girls Roll into Weekend’.
Mora found the movies while searching through the national archives for an upcoming documentary on Nazi propaganda films.
“The quality of the films is fantastic,” says Mora. “The Nazis were obsessed with recording everything and every single image was controlled.”
So now when you jump on a forum to argue about the 3D format, you can rest assured that someone, eventually, will bring up this little tidbit.
(via Variety)
Heather Lamendola-Ormsbee
That is to say that any time people get in a heated discussion, eventually one of them will compare the views of the other to the Nazis.
YUP. Every single time, too. But I’m having a hard time swallowing that the Nazi’s invented 3D. Steroscopy can be dated as far back as 1838, so the probability that the Nazi’s were the only ones to come up with the concept of using it for motion pictures seems unlikely, but I’m not an expert on the subject. Just an avid Wikipedia reader.
Also, you’re a Nazi for writing this article!!!! (I kid, I kid)
Dick Ward
They weren’t the first to think of it, but the Nazis were the first to do it and that’s what counts 🙂
Wait, did I come to the defense of the Nazis? That’s a weird feeling.
Gareth Callenby
I agree, Dick. The Nazis were pretty great.
EM
A great bunch of Schweinhünde!!
William Henley
I must admit that I was thinking the same thing. Shoot, I have tons of stereograph slides from World War 1 and before that were passed down through the family. Applying it to film was a logical connection.
However, I am not sure if it was the first moving pictures in 3D. Many of the Penny arcades from the early part of the century featured rapidly changing slides, and you looked through a stereoscopic viewer to look at them. Unfortunately, I have only seen one, and it was 2D, so I have no information as to if any of those was “stereo”. However, if they were, that would predate the Nazis.
EM
“The 3d Reich in 3D!!”
Dick Ward
I feel like it’s time for a sequel, remake, or reimagining of ‘Hitler on Ice’
EM
So long as it’s immediately followed by “Springtime for Hitler”—so that the ice thaws and the Führer goes kersplash und kaputt!
William Henley
Sounds like History Channel’s next big WW2 production – WW2 in 3D! “After an exhaustive 5 year search, we found what may be some of the world’s first 3D movies. These have been cleaned up and restored, brought to you in stunning 3D HD, to take you into the war like never before!”
Josh Zyber
* “All footage has been cropped and stretched from its original 4:3 aspect ratio to fill a 16:9 HDTV because we hate black bars almost as much as the Nazis hated anyone of different ethnicity, color, or religion than themselves.”
EM
It’s official: people who crop or stretch material to fill TV screens are like Nazis. 😛
Dick Ward
You said it, not me.
http://www.highdefdigest.com/blog/consumer-reports-tv-reviews/
EM
“ANAGLYPHE MACHT DREI”
krylonman
Philippe Mora?!? That’s the guy who directed ‘Howling II: Your Sister Is a Werewolf,’ ‘Howling III: The Marsupials’ (yes), ‘The Beast Within,’ that bonkers adaptation of ‘Communion’ with Christopher Walken…and is now getting excusive access to never-before-seen, historically important footage from the Third Reich. What a world.
(He did start off doing documentaries with found footage like this, although he apparently was never able to make anything coherent out of them. I hope this one is better than ‘Brother Can You Spare a Dime’ is supposed to be.)