Youtube removing the Hitler "Downfall" Parodies

If you've been around the Internet at all, I'm sure you've seen them. There's a German movie called Downfall, about Hitler's last days in the bunker. There's a very memorable scene whether Hitler goes off on a rant to his underlings. It's truly brilliant. Since the movie is in German, it's subtitled.

Some wiseguy on the Net decided to take that scene and add his own script to it, making Hitler rant about something or other (I have no idea what the first one was about). Soon, it became a Youtube standard, used for everything from the NHL Trade Deadline to Michael Jackson's death. These videos were all over the place! There was even one where he ranted about becoming the subject of a Youtube meme. Most of them were hilarious, though they were starting to get old.

According to Mashable (and many, many other web sites), Constantin Films has demanded that Youtube remove these videos due to copyright infringement. The director thinks they're funny, but heaven forbid the movie get any free publicity by being plastered all over the Net! That wouldn't make economic sense, would it?

I really don't understand why they would do this. These parodies are bringing the film to millions of people who may not be aware (or interested) in this film. Bruno Ganz's performance as Hitler is phenomenal in this scene, and I would think seeing it here would make some people actually want to watch the movie. What better publicity could you get? I think this is a really stupid move on Constantin's part.

Anyway, TechNews.am posted yesterday that "YouTube indirectly responded on its blog today by encouraging its users to dispute the takedowns through a process it already has in place for situations like this." Hopefully, this means that most of them will be returned.

Just in case they aren't, though, take a look at what Hitler thinks of being removed from Youtube. (Warning, much profanity, though it's subtitled profanity)



"Don't worry. He'll realize the irony soon." Priceless!

(H/T: for the embedded video, thanks to Jonah Goldberg for mentioning it!)