Recensie Eldorado: Everything the Nazis Hate (Netflix)
Director: Benjamin Cantu, Matt Lambert | Script: Benjamin Cantu, Felix Kriegsheim Cast: Eren Güvercin (Manassa Herbst), Eli Otto Kappo (Charlotte Charlaque), Antonio Lallo (Ernst Röhm), Livia Matthes (Lisa von Dobneck), Nicolo Pasetti (Gottfried von Cramm) ea | Time to play: 92 minutes | Year: 2023
Eldorado: Everything Nazis Hate it is named after an important club in Berlin: Eldorado. In this club, queer people could be themselves. Lesbian women, gay men and transgender people came without fear that they could be arrested at any time. However, the name of the documentary is somewhat misleading, as it is more of a portrait of the growing hatred of queer people as the Nazis gain more and more power. Eldorado plays more of an important supporting role as the setting in which these characters moved than a leading role.
This documentary consists of a mix of talking heads, archival footage, and a large number of staged scenes that outline the era. The staged images in particular are beautiful. Some of this takes place at the Eldorado club and there is a lot to see there, from beautiful costumes and colorful figures to warm lighting. In this way, the atmosphere of that time is really revived and you can imagine what it was like to walk through the Eldorado club in the 20s.
Choosing a broader view of the rise in hatred against queer people during the Nazi period in Germany has its advantages and disadvantages. The advantage is that the viewer gets a lot of information about the impact National Socialism had on the LGBTQ+ community, but at the same time it means a loss of focus. All the people featured sound like people who could easily win their own movie, so the movie lacks depth. It sparks interest, but doesn’t really provide the amount of information you’d like.
The same goes for (experienced) experts speaking, they also have little time to really discuss their fields of expertise or background. It’s a shame, especially those who actually lived through the time that you could listen to for hours, because the stories they tell keep an important story alive.
Like an everything Elodorado: Everything Nazis Hate aesthetically pleasing documentary. The content is, of course, much darker. However, the scenic representations and the hopeful (experience) experts assure that not everything is pessimism. Although the balance is sometimes thrown off when it comes to exploring the different characters, that balance is present in the way the story is told. And that this is a story worth telling is clear.
Eldorado: Everything Nazis Hate can be seen in Netflix.