Pacionsbo Absolutely Fantastic

StyleSk8r At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

Hayden Kane There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

Deanna There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

TOMASBBloodhound Perhaps if this diminutive propaganda minister hadn't been such an outcast as a youth, he wouldn't have grown up to be such a jerk. The Goebbels Experiment is definitely worth your time if you're into WWII history, and hope to learn what might have made some of these villains tick. Kenneth Branagh lends his voice to an hour and a half of diary entries from Joseph Goebbels, a would-be novelist, poet, propagandist, and fascist anti-Semite who rose from obscurity along with Hitler, and helped his fuhrer terrorize a great many people. We learn of his painful and lonely childhood marred by crippling polio and then being shunned by his schoolmates. We hear the angst felt by many during the Weimar years, and the antisemitism pooling inside him. By the early 1920s, Goebbels has fallen under Hitler's spell, and the two men's destinies are intertwined for the rest of their lives... until their brutal suicides.Anyone looking for insight into the cause of this man's hatred of Jews won't find much. Antisemitism in Europe hardly began with the Third Reich, and didn't end with it either. The bulk of this film centers around squabbles within the party, and Goebbels' ideas of what make good or bad propaganda. Despite his extramarital affairs (which he only hints at), Goebbels still attempts to portray himself as the quintessential German family man. With WWII raging around him, he still lives the high life by hobnobbing with actors, traveling to swanky Paris and Venice, all the while enjoying the power his position has afforded him. The journal entries turn noticeably pessimistic and more urgent, from the moment he mentions reading a letter from a commander on the eastern front. Suddenly, the fortunes of war seem to be turning. Not much in the way of specific battles are mentioned. Again, this is not exactly a blow- by-blow account off the war. Just the musings of one of the key players. His relationship with Hitler starts as some sort of a man-crush, then goes through a phase of distrust, then ultimately ends up trying to reason with him over mistakes he has made fighting the war. Goebbels also claims to be one of the few Nazi leaders respected by their soldiers on the battlefield.From the time he hears of the trouble in Russia, Goebbels can most likely guess that his future, and that of the people closest to him, looks quite dark indeed. Still he urges the German people to fight on, and many do... until the very end. And we see this end in graphic detail. Do we the audience feel in any way sorry for him? Maybe for his family, but the words of this man deserve a harsh punishment. And they must never be forgotten. The Goebbels experiment is worth your time. A good blend of newsreel footage, speeches, and an inside look at one of the most notorious figures of perhaps the most evil regime of all time. 8 of 10 stars.The Hound.

jimlacy2003 (Contains only mild spoilers, if at all)I watch a lot of WW2 documentaries. Pretty much everything I can get my hands on. Literally over a hundred of them in my collection.This has to be one of the best since it has some of the least bias of them all. Here you take sort of a trip through the eyes of Joseph Goebbels him self. One of the highest of Hitlers henchmen and the Nazi party. The entire narrative is spoken from Goebbels diary. So you get his point of view; how he saw him self, the war, Germany, Hitler, and so on.Where this is great it's a problem with the majority of WW2 documentaries. It's an injustice to just demonize everyone and everything about the German side of WW2. Sure Hitler's Naziism was organized Evil, but the point is you have to see things as they are/were. View the facts and the full data of WW2 to understand how it came about and what transpired. Something everyone the world needs to understand. Less we let this dark history repeat it's self again.This movie is not the best for new WW2 enthusiasts. It is probably better to watch some other documentaries (and, or, read) that cover who Goebbels was and the over all relation to Hitler and how events unfold over the war. It just sort of adds a lot to over all picture. This is not an epic chronology of the war. And although I found it very entertaining, it is not really an "entertainment" movie. It's more about enlightenment.One of the neatest things I got out of it was how he looked at "propaganda". How he so zealously and purposely went about it. He went about it as a science and an art. It was not "brain washing", it was not about tricking people into believing something. It was about rallying the German people into a fervor to work and fight harder, to keep them in high spirits, and then on the outside to convince the world to join the Nazi cause. And yes too, those evil attempts to lure the Jewish population into believing the death camps where some sort of "Club Med" vacation - happy time - work place.Furthermore how he saw films as an excellent propaganda vehicle and then he comments on how the Allies where bad at it in their own films. It dawned on me that yes maybe they are both "propaganda" but then one was more to inform in a democratic, fairly free thinking way, where the other (Goebbels) to more directly say "this is what is is", "this is what is happening", "think this". And how similar bad propaganda is happening today to push political views and so on..If you are a WW2 history buff then you definitely want to see this film.

valis1949 In the fascinating documentary, THE GOEBBELS EXPERIMENT, Kenneth Branagh elicits a dramatic reading from Goebbels's personal journal while the viewer watches vintage film and news clips from the era. Carefully crafted and diligently compiled, the film reveals Joseph Goebbels to be a very human, three dimensional character- equal parts loathsome, and possibly brilliant, yet clearly trapped in a doomed and misguided chapter of world history. Joseph Goebbels was arguably the highest ranking 'non-gangster' of National Socialism's inner circle. Although a virulent anti-semite, and certainly afflicted by megalomania, Goebbels did exhibit a certain degree of intellectualism which was noticeably absent from the rest of Hitler's ruling elite. All historically significant men, and unfortunately, Hitler was one such man, require a facilitator who can translate their fundamental message to the world at large. And, Joseph Goebbels became the perfect individual who aptly aided The Fuhrer to codify, clarify, and disseminate his demented political and social policies. Certainly Goebbels was on the wrong side of history, but this fine film examines his reasons and motivations quite admirably.

groggo Writers-directors Lutz Hachmeister and Michael Kloft structured this documentary in an unusual way by offering the actual words from Joseph Goebbels's 1924-1945 diaries. Goebbels's word are spoken by the gifted British actor-director Kenneth Branagh, who unfortunately reads them as if he were just passing through town and needed a few extra bucks. Goebbels was a man of mercurial emotion, but that's hard to pick up from Branagh's rapid-fire and seemingly diffident delivery.The film's structure leads to bigger problems: there are too many glaring omissions of crucial events in world history. A second narrator should have been used to fill in these gaps.The examples of omission are numerous. We get a mere passing glance at the invasion of Poland, the event that was singularly responsible for launching World War II in Europe. We barely see the violent roundup of Jews all over the country, although Goebbels wrote often about his hatred of the 'Juden'. The Battle of Britain, a critical early turning point in the war that is often credited with dissuading Hitler from invading England, is not even mentioned. The war on the eastern front with Russia is barely examined, we hear only scant mention of D-Day, there is no reference to the famous attempt on Hitler's life, and the film abruptly ends in less than five minutes with the pristine bodies of Goebbels's children and his own charred corpse.The film does work as an examination of Goebbels's exasperation and frustrated self-importance (he saw himself as a possible Fuhrer). His smugness and arrogance are noted throughout in his diaries. He imagines himself as a 'new' Dostoyevsky, he deems the brilliant cinematographer-propagandist Leni Reifenstahl as an irritating 'minor' talent, he scoffs at Goering, Himmler and others, and he fairly glows when Der Adolph pats him on the back.Joseph Goebbels and his 'philosophy' of propaganda (repeat lies often enough and they will eventually be interpreted by the public as truth) are alive and well in our society. Goebbels may be dead, but his ideas, in different forms, live on.