Moral about Poland

Rewatching this wonderful film all the way through for the first time since the '90s (in part as prep. for Jo Jo Rabbit), I was newly struck by just how terrible Poland's fate was at the end of WW2. Lubitsch sees the Poles as some of the Nazis' first victims and accurately reports that lots of Poles escaped to the UK and that squadrons of Polish pilots flew important missions from the Battle of Britain onwards.

Lubitsch comfortingly asserts & shows that the Nazis *will* lose, that they are ultimately ludicrous, & that the madness and slavish followership that gave Fascism its initial shocking advantages *will* also quickly undermine it. So far so good. But Lubitsch also assumes that any *victory* by the Allies worthy of its name will have to liberate Warsaw & Poland. The Poles are deeply Allies and any 'victory' that leaves them in bondage is a sham. Infamously, of course, the Western Allies declined to fight for Poland at the end of WW2 leaving them instead to the tender mercies of the Soviet Union (who'd originally invaded and divided Poland *with* the Nazis back in 1939) for the next 40 years or so.

To Be or Not to Be (1942) in this way teaches some painful lessons. Yes the Nazis will lose. But the Allies won't win either, not the way they wanted to, and they'll largely lie to themselves about their betrayal of Poland to avoid having a bad conscience about this.