Hanussen (1988)

A Film from the Artur Brauner Collection at Our Library

A head injury just before the end of the First World War lends the Austrian vaudeville illusionist Klaus Schneider seemingly clairvoyant abilities. Schneider adopts the artist name Erik-Jan Hanussen and predicts the rise of fascism, the election of Hitler as Chancellor, and the Reichstag fire. The last of these predictions makes the Nazis suspicious of the politically naive Hanussen, whom many consider to be a fascist. The Nazis see him as a traitor and arrange his murder in 1933.

Map with all buildings that belong to the Jewish Museum Berlin. The W. M. Blumenthal Academy is marked in green

Where

W. M. Blumenthal Academy, Library
Fromet-und-Moses-Mendelssohn-Platz 1, 10969 Berlin
Postal address: Lindenstraße 9-14, 10969 Berlin

Starring Klaus Maria Brandauer in the title role, the film is based on the biography of the Viennese Jew Hermann Chajm Steinschneider, who sought to draw in the Nazis with his art of occultism and mass suggestion.

With Klaus Maria Brandauer. Directed by István Szabó.