The Titanic as anti-British propaganda?

Nazi Germany seems to have viewed it that way. Courtesy of John Edwards at the Ocean Liners Blog, we learn that the Nazis made a film in 1943 about the sinking of the Titanic. Wikipedia has this to say about it:

The film was shot on board the SS Cap Arcona, a passenger cruise ship which itself was sunk in the last weeks of World War II with a loss of life far heavier than that on the actual Titanic. The scenes with the lifeboats were filmed on the Baltic Sea and some of the interior scenes were shot in Tobis Studios.

Titanic was the most expensive German production up until that time and endured many production difficulties, including a clash of egos, massive creative differences and general war-time frustrations. The film's original director, Herbert Selpin was heard making unflattering comments about the Kriegsmarine officers, who were more concerned with molesting the female cast members rather than doing their job as marine consultants of the film. His close friend and co-writer of the script, Walter Zerlett-Olfenius, reported him to the Gestapo and Selpin was promptly arrested and personally questioned by Joseph Goebbels, who was the driving force behind the Titanic project. Within twenty-four hours of his arrest, Herbert Selpin was found hanged in his jail cell, which was ruled a suicide. The cast and crew were angry and attempted to retaliate, but were quickly silenced with fear for their own safety. The unfinished film, the production of which spiraled wildly out control, was in the end completed by Werner Klingler.

The premiere was supposed to be in early 1943, but the theatre that housed the answer print was bombed the night before the big event. The film went on to have a lacklustre premiere in Paris around Christmas of that same year, but in the end, Goebbels banned it altogether, stating that the German people, at that point going through almost nightly Allied bombing raids, were less than enthusiastic about seeing a film that portrayed mass death and panic.

There's more at the link.

The entire movie has been uploaded to YouTube. Here's Part 1 (of 9 in total).

Links to further parts may be found by going to Part 1's page on YouTube and looking in the 'Suggestions' column.

I've watched a few of the parts. I give it very low marks for creativity and authenticity - the ideological message is smeared thickly and with a heavy hand - but as a piece of cinematic and propaganda history, I daresay it has its uses.

Peter