(NOTE: The following review will contain minor spoilers necessary solely for the discussion of plot and/or characters. If you’re the type of reader who prefers a review entirely spoiler-free, then I’d encourage you to skip down to the last few paragraphs for the final assessment. If, however, you’re accepting of a few modest hints at ‘things to come,’ then read on …)
From the film’s IMDB.com page citation:
“Two best friends go back in time to kill Hitler when he was a child. When all turns haywire, the two turn to their mutual love Mary Jane, to help them on their epic adventure to save the world from evil. Until.”
Mind you: there’s an inherent risk associated with humanizing any vile dictator from human history, and there always will be.
For example, 2019’s awarding-winning Jojo Rabbit toyed with the idea of presenting none other than Adolf Hitler as little more than an imaginary friend to young Jojo Betzler, a good-natured child trying to make his way through 1939’s Nazi Germany. The satire wasn’t exactly well-received by the meat-and-potatoes crowd (i.e. regular folks) but was a bit of a darling for the cultural elite. Though it was no box office failure in any estimation, the feel-good story of a kid looking to the Great Leader as a source of inspiration (that he somewhat overcomes) just didn’t quite resonate as anything more than a Progressive exercise. Recasting a mass murderer under the fabric of Comedy works fine for some, but it’ll rarely find an audience where Jack and Jill haven’t forgotten their world history and the crimes associated to it.
Enter 2017’s Raising Hitler, a web-series that kinda/sorta had a similar jumping off point, that being of re-examining ‘Herr Wolf’ by taking viewers back to the days of his youth were young Adi was a victim of an overbearing father. Jesse Wagnon (played by Lucas Englander) and Mickey Applebaum (Ziad El May) – the two time-traveling stoners who believe they’re doing the world a favor by going back to drown the would-be ruler in a river – can’t help but pity the child, so much so that Mickey absconds with the kid in hopes of, instead, raising him as his own in hopes that a stronger nurturing might remove all thoughts of genocide from the still-developing mind. The comic rub? Well, both Jesse and Mickey are Jewish; and by trying to do good by their faith they inevitably learn that antisemitism paired with murderous intent could very well result in someone else picking up the Fuhrer’s original schtick and running with it anyway. The world they created is even worse, making little Adi into little more than the lesser of two evils.
As is always the case, there’s a bit more to the action here, but what I’ve recounted is the basic premise that’s been built for laughs. Sadly, said laughs are few and far between – well, unless you’re the kind of viewer who finds it funny every single time someone lights a doobie (I’m not) – but this isn’t to suggest that Raising Hitler doesn’t have some technical and creative merits. It’s all expertly assembled and, frankly, looks far better than it should. Because so much of what’s in here feels like a comic skit that grew proportionally larger than what was possible, it all ends up feeling like a project in transition: there likely wasn’t enough money to go as big as they wanted, so the finished product earns its stripes by sticking to the slim pickings of an idea with nothing extra. That’s sad because I think the ending suggests that the writers might’ve had a more interesting destination if it were continued, but otherwise what remains makes for a palatable enough distraction to be a one-off experience.
Raising Hitler (2017) was produced by BlackPills. DVD distribution (for this particular release) has been handled by the fine folks at Darkside Releasing. As for the technical specifications? While I’m no trained video expert, I can still assure readers that the provided sights and sounds are actually quite impressive, especially given the fact that all of this began its creative life as little more than a web-series. It all looks really, really good, so don’t be put off by the presentation at all. Lastly, if you’re looking for special features? Sorry, Charlie, but this is a bare bones release with nothing but the flick and some trailers.
Alas … only Mildly Recommended.
Essentially a ‘stoner Comedy’ and little else, Raising Hitler (2017) clearly set the bar so high that it really couldn’t quite deliver on its idea, that being of two knuckleheads traveling back in time with the purpose of killing li’l Adolf but getting uncharacteristically won over by the dour munchkin’s attitude (with no reasonable explanation). Though the prospects for bigger laughs were there (i.e. child actor Moritz Hoyer makes the most of a one-note performance as the ‘kid who would be The Fuhrer’), the web series turned 60+ minute movie just never amounted to more than the comedy sketch construct. Even worse, one might suggest that it ends on a cliffhanger that needed closure for any of what came before to work … and now almost a decade later audiences are still waiting for any plausible explanation. Sigh.
In the interests of fairness, I’m pleased to disclose that the fine folks at Allied Vaughn provided me with a complimentary Blu-ray of Raising Hitler (2017) by request for the expressed purpose of completing this review. Their contribution to me in no way, shape, or form influenced my opinion of it.
-- EZ
From the film’s IMDB.com page citation:
“Two best friends go back in time to kill Hitler when he was a child. When all turns haywire, the two turn to their mutual love Mary Jane, to help them on their epic adventure to save the world from evil. Until.”
Mind you: there’s an inherent risk associated with humanizing any vile dictator from human history, and there always will be.
For example, 2019’s awarding-winning Jojo Rabbit toyed with the idea of presenting none other than Adolf Hitler as little more than an imaginary friend to young Jojo Betzler, a good-natured child trying to make his way through 1939’s Nazi Germany. The satire wasn’t exactly well-received by the meat-and-potatoes crowd (i.e. regular folks) but was a bit of a darling for the cultural elite. Though it was no box office failure in any estimation, the feel-good story of a kid looking to the Great Leader as a source of inspiration (that he somewhat overcomes) just didn’t quite resonate as anything more than a Progressive exercise. Recasting a mass murderer under the fabric of Comedy works fine for some, but it’ll rarely find an audience where Jack and Jill haven’t forgotten their world history and the crimes associated to it.
Enter 2017’s Raising Hitler, a web-series that kinda/sorta had a similar jumping off point, that being of re-examining ‘Herr Wolf’ by taking viewers back to the days of his youth were young Adi was a victim of an overbearing father. Jesse Wagnon (played by Lucas Englander) and Mickey Applebaum (Ziad El May) – the two time-traveling stoners who believe they’re doing the world a favor by going back to drown the would-be ruler in a river – can’t help but pity the child, so much so that Mickey absconds with the kid in hopes of, instead, raising him as his own in hopes that a stronger nurturing might remove all thoughts of genocide from the still-developing mind. The comic rub? Well, both Jesse and Mickey are Jewish; and by trying to do good by their faith they inevitably learn that antisemitism paired with murderous intent could very well result in someone else picking up the Fuhrer’s original schtick and running with it anyway. The world they created is even worse, making little Adi into little more than the lesser of two evils.
As is always the case, there’s a bit more to the action here, but what I’ve recounted is the basic premise that’s been built for laughs. Sadly, said laughs are few and far between – well, unless you’re the kind of viewer who finds it funny every single time someone lights a doobie (I’m not) – but this isn’t to suggest that Raising Hitler doesn’t have some technical and creative merits. It’s all expertly assembled and, frankly, looks far better than it should. Because so much of what’s in here feels like a comic skit that grew proportionally larger than what was possible, it all ends up feeling like a project in transition: there likely wasn’t enough money to go as big as they wanted, so the finished product earns its stripes by sticking to the slim pickings of an idea with nothing extra. That’s sad because I think the ending suggests that the writers might’ve had a more interesting destination if it were continued, but otherwise what remains makes for a palatable enough distraction to be a one-off experience.
Raising Hitler (2017) was produced by BlackPills. DVD distribution (for this particular release) has been handled by the fine folks at Darkside Releasing. As for the technical specifications? While I’m no trained video expert, I can still assure readers that the provided sights and sounds are actually quite impressive, especially given the fact that all of this began its creative life as little more than a web-series. It all looks really, really good, so don’t be put off by the presentation at all. Lastly, if you’re looking for special features? Sorry, Charlie, but this is a bare bones release with nothing but the flick and some trailers.
Alas … only Mildly Recommended.
Essentially a ‘stoner Comedy’ and little else, Raising Hitler (2017) clearly set the bar so high that it really couldn’t quite deliver on its idea, that being of two knuckleheads traveling back in time with the purpose of killing li’l Adolf but getting uncharacteristically won over by the dour munchkin’s attitude (with no reasonable explanation). Though the prospects for bigger laughs were there (i.e. child actor Moritz Hoyer makes the most of a one-note performance as the ‘kid who would be The Fuhrer’), the web series turned 60+ minute movie just never amounted to more than the comedy sketch construct. Even worse, one might suggest that it ends on a cliffhanger that needed closure for any of what came before to work … and now almost a decade later audiences are still waiting for any plausible explanation. Sigh.
In the interests of fairness, I’m pleased to disclose that the fine folks at Allied Vaughn provided me with a complimentary Blu-ray of Raising Hitler (2017) by request for the expressed purpose of completing this review. Their contribution to me in no way, shape, or form influenced my opinion of it.
-- EZ
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