| Starring: | Kenneth Branagh Stanley Tucci Colin Firth Ian McNeice Kevin McNally David Threlfall |
| Director: | Frank Pierson |
| Producer: | Nick Gillott Frank Pierson |
| Composer: | Dennis McCarthy |
| Cinematography: | Stephen Goldblatt |
| Editor: | Peter Zinner |
| Company: | BBC HBO Films |
| Network: | HBO |
| Runtime: | 96 minutes |
| Language: | English German |
| Country: | United Kingdom United States |
Conspiracy is a 2001 made-for-television drama film that dramatises the 1942 Wannsee Conference. Using the authentic script taken from the only surviving transcript recorded during the meeting, the film delves into the psychology of Nazi officials involved in the "Final Solution of the Jewish question" during World War II.
The film was written by Loring Mandel and directed by Frank Pierson. Its ensemble cast includes Kenneth Branagh, Stanley Tucci, Colin Firth and David Threlfall. Branagh won a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor, and Tucci was awarded a Golden Globe Award for his supporting role.
On 20 January 1942, Nazi officials hold a conference at a villa in Wannsee, a wealthy district on the outskirts of Berlin, to determine the method by which they will make Germany's territory free of Jews, including the occupied countries of Poland, Reichskommissariat Ostland, Czechoslovakia and France.
Chairing the meeting is Reinhard Heydrich, chief of the Reich Security Main Office, who states he has been given a mandate in the form of a directive from Reichsmarschall Hermann Göring to achieve a "complete solution of the Jewish question." Friedrich Wilhelm Kritzinger responds that the meeting is pointless and that the Jewish question has already been settled. Heydrich announces that the government's policy will change from emigration to "evacuation", and Fascist Italy will be forced to cooperate. There is consternation over the use of euphemisms from several of the participants, and Heydrich insinuates a policy of genocide that will become more explicit as the meeting progresses.
The men discuss sterilisation and exemptions for mixed-race Jews who have one or more non-Jewish grandparents. Heydrich's willingness to entertain various competing ideas suggests the ultimate fate of the Jews has not been decided. As the discussion continues, however, it becomes evident to the participants that the purpose of the meeting is not to formulate policy but to receive direction from the SS. Heydrich calls a break in the proceedings, and after praising Dr. Wilhelm Stuckart, a lawyer in the Reich Ministry for the Interior, takes Stuckart aside to warn him about the consequences of his stubbornness. On reconvening, Heydrich reveals in frank detail the policy that had already been decided before the meeting convened: the wholesale extermination of Europe's Jewish population using gas chambers and ovens to incinerate the bodies.
SS-Obersturmbannführer Adolf Eichmann then reveals that the SS has been building extermination camps at Belzec, Sobibor and Treblinka, and making preparations for the "Final Solution" under the noses of Germany's civilian bureaucrats. Eichmann describes the method that will be used: asphyxiation of Jews in gas chambers built at locations such as Auschwitz.
Throughout the meeting and over refreshments attendees raise other side issues, reflecting the interests of their respective work areas, including concerns that cholera and typhus could break out from the overpopulated ghettos in Poland. A break is called and this time it is Kritzinger's turn to be taken aside and intimidated by Heydrich. Kritzinger realizes that any hopes he had of assuring livable conditions for the Jewish population are unrealistic. In return, he tells Heydrich a cautionary tale about a man consumed by hatred of his father, so much so that his life loses its meaning once his father dies. Heydrich later interprets this as a warning that a similar fate awaits them after the Jews are exterminated, though he rejects the warning, telling Müller and Eichmann that he will not miss the Jews.
Heydrich then recalls and concludes the meeting. He also asks for explicit assent and support from each official, one by one. After giving careful instructions on the secrecy of the minutes and notes of the meeting, they adjourn and begin to depart.
As the officials depart, a brief account of the fate of each one is given. Most of the members either died during the war or were arrested immediately after; two, Josef Bühler and Karl Eberhard Schongarth, are convicted by Allied military tribunals and executed, and the others acquitted to live a peaceful life in postwar West Germany. Heydrich would be assassinated by Czechoslovak partisans for his brutal rule in Bohemia and Moravia within six months, while Eichmann would flee to Buenos Aires but be captured, tried and sentenced to death by Israel in the 1960s. The film ends with the house tidied up and all records of the meeting destroyed as if it had never happened. The final card before the credits reveals that Luther's copy of the Wannsee minutes, recovered by the US Army in the archives of the German Foreign Office in 1947, was the only record of the conference to survive.
Additional cast members include:
Colin Callendar, head of HBO NYC productions, identifies two primary historical arguments underpinning the narrative.[1] He underscores the conference's role as a mechanism for consolidating Reinhard Heydrich's authority and that of the SS in executing the infamous "Final Solution." He also emphasizes the film's portrayal of a lack of a clearly defined and centralized policy preceding the Wannsee Conference. These insights reflect a functionalist interpretation of the Holocaust, highlighting the evolutionary and radicalizing nature of the genocide, often originating from lower ranks within the Nazi hierarchy. Callendar also notes the presence distinct groups of various ranking officials (and their conflict objectives) underscores the Holocaust's emergence as a result of competing interests among different governmental agencies.
In addition to Callendar, the producers had the input of three historians, including Michael Berenbaum of the United States Holocaust Museum and Andrea Axelrod as a historical advisor. Noted Holocaust historian Christopher Browning also acted as a consultant. Browning offered small critiques, including geographical mistakes, references to speeches and events that had not yet happened in January 1942 and how the German officials referred to each other. Axelrod provided extensive research and documentation (amounting to 170 citations), including verifying the amount of snowfall in Wansee on the date of the conference.[2]
Pierson brought Mandel into the project initially for an unproduced script entitled Complicity. This was intended to be a companion movie detailing the failure of the Allies to help with Jewish refugees. The piece never made it to the screen, most likely as a result of the sensitive subject of culpability of Western Allies.
Mandel utilized the only existing copy of the conference minutes, called the Wansee Protocols, found in 1947 in the German Foreign Office files as the basis for the script.[3] During an interview discussing a later adaptation of the screenplay into a theatre production, the author noted "I had never heard of the Wansee Conference" and that Pierson told him "...it was the first thing he had encountered about the Holocaust that angered him rather than making him want to cry", he signed on to write the screenplay.[4] The script is not verbatim from conversations at the conference and most of the actual dialogue is invented. The meeting occurred over a period of 90 minutes, which is the same running time of the movie.
Kenneth Branagh, the actor portraying Heydrich in the film, reported that he found the role deeply unsettling.[5] Despite grappling with a profound aversion towards the historical figure he portrayed, Branagh is acclaimed for delivering a remarkable portrayal of the allegedly flamboyant officer. Branagh's portrayal was challenging not only by the difficulty of delivering lines but also by the absence of discernible motivations or upbringing factors explaining Heydrich's chilling readiness to perpetrate genocide on an unprecedented scale. Branagh reaffirmed a recurring theme of the film, emphasizing its commitment to historical accuracy over sensationalism or star power, underscoring the importance of authentically recounting this harrowing chapter of history.
Conspiracy has a 100% approval rating from 7 critic reviews on Rotten Tomatoes.[6]
In The American Historical Review, Alan E. Steinweis critically analyzes the film, offering insights from a historian's perspective.[7] Steinweis highlights instances within the film where certain scenes are identified as dramatic inventions, pointing out discrepancies between historical accuracy and cinematic portrayal. However, Steinweis underscores a common limitation in historians' critiques of films, noting their tendency to focus solely on specific fictionalized elements while overlooking broader thematic arguments and the overarching vision of the film.
Steinweis also juxtaposes Conspiracy with its 1984 German predecessor, Die Wannseekonferenz, suggesting that the earlier film may offer a more historically accurate depiction by providing a more detailed examination of the killing process. He critiques the portrayal of Reinhard Heydrich in Conspiracy while commending the depiction of Adolf Eichmann as "refreshing." Yet, Steinweis argues that a deeper analysis, often absent in historical reviews of films, would involve an exploration of the film's production history to uncover the filmmakers' intentions, historical arguments, and research methodologies underlying the film's creation.
James Rampton in The Independent praised the film:
An impressed Austin Film Society had a lengthy review of the film and details about its making.[8]