In his excellent introduction to Planet Auschwitz, author Brian Crim states his thesis clearly: “Auschwitz is constantly imagined, reimagined, and depicted in every conceivable medium and genre to the point that its historical context is subordinated to the cultural moment” (3). Using a case-study method, Crim has examined horror and science fiction (SF) films and TV series to explore Holocaust depictions. The term “Holocaust” is here used broadly to define not only the specific site Auschwitz but also themes of psychological trauma, such as guilt and grief, and the fascism of both the Third Reich and the afterlife of Nazism. The well-chosen cover from the 2009 Norwegian film “Dead Snow” features zombie Nazi soldiers. The imagery is important. Crim believes that, far from trivializing or normalizing the Holocaust, “integrating Holocaust imagery and story lines into horror and SF helps engage audiences that are normally alienated or intimidated by the Holocaust of history” (6).
Both horror and SF have significant historical roots in the nineteenth century. Dr. Frankenstein created a monster using science, and nineteenth-century Gothic horror in art and literature is well studied. The German expressionist films of the Weimar era translated horror into film. “Nosferatu” (1922) features a Transylvanian vampire and would subsequently provide Nazis with images of East European Jews as monstrous. Fritz Lang's 1927 film “Metropolis” brought to the screen the confrontation with ever more complex technology embodied in the gynoid cyborg “Maria.” Lang's workers march soulless into the maw of a factory—they are zombies. Crim makes clear, however, that these Weimar horror and SF films point back to the atrocities of World War I's industrialized killings and do not anticipate the coming horrors of the Nazi era.
The zombie of Auschwitz is the emaciated near-death laborer labeled in the camp as the Muselmann. Crim provides a close analysis of the use of this figure in the AMC TV series “The Walking Dead” that was based on Robert Kirkman's story of a post–zombie apocalypse world. The show uses images that deliberately reference Auschwitz (mountains of bones, boxcars, a gas canister, sinister train tracks, extermination sites) without referencing the historic Auschwitz. The 2014 series “The Leftover” deals with a Holocaust equivalent. In a global cataclysm, 140 million people disappear. How do the survivors deal with intense grief, guilt, cynicism, paranoia, and madness? The Holocaust metaphor is obvious. Crim offers helpful, detailed plot summaries for what he sees as a truthful and genuine interpretation of collective grief and trauma (79).
The cultural legacy of the crimes of the Third Reich in film represents the collision of history, trauma, memory, and national identity. The Nazi monster in the military horror films starting about 1960 are not slow plodding zombies but rather demonstrably evil, organized super soldiers. Crim provides dozens of titles and plot summaries on both American and European “Nazisploitation” films. A new addition to horror is the Nazi vampire: sentient monsters striving to annihilate the earth (“Lost Boys,” 1987; “Blood Creek,” 2009). The FX series “The Strain” (2014–17) presents Nazi vampires, apocalyptic plots, genocidal attacks on humanity and invokes Gothic antisemitism, Nazi supernatural tropes, and actual Holocaust documentary features in an apotheosis of the genre.
Analysis of current SF moves from the Auschwitz images to those of the Third Reich and fascism. Crim refers to this as “astrofascism.” The 1997 Verkoeven film “Starship Troopers” as well as the Lukas “Star Wars” films outfit soldiers in futuristic outfits as they engage in planetary annihilation/genocides. The 1983 “V” miniseries and the counterfactual “Man in the High Castle” offer minimal connections to the historical Holocaust but much to fascist ideology. The same holds true for the “Terminator” films and the “Battlestar Galactica” series that exhibit only faint echoes of the Holocaust.
Crim offers close readings of one hundred films and TV series. He displays careful attention to the ethical and creative plots of the best of them, but he also highlights the weak and lazy efforts. His bibliography and filmography are deep and highly informative. His search for Holocaust representation reveals, as can be expected, that the historical accuracy of Resnais's 1955 “Night and Fog” has left only a faint cultural palimpsest in Nazi zombie vampire films. There have been other historical genocides and cultural atrocities since Auschwitz. Have the Chinese cultural revolution, Pol Pot's Cambodian Killing Fields, and the Rwandan genocide been reflected in horror and SF films? Is the Holocaust a unique influence on horror and SF?
