Remember the “Hitler reacts to…” meme? Filmmaker Taika Waititi does. The official Twitter account for the director’s new movie “Jojo Rabbit” updates the popular meme, depicting the Nazi leader’s reaction to being parodied.
It’s an oldie but a goodie. The video even jokes that the original meme is, like, a decade old now (the “Know Your Meme” database says the first version of it dates back to 2006). But you can’t have a movie about Hitler without Adolf Hitler himself getting mad about it.
The clip shows Hitler’s generals explaining to him that “Jojo Rabbit” is a “satirical” film about a German boy who has Hitler for an imaginary best friend. The trouble starts when they explain that Waititi, who also wrote and directed the film, is a “Polynesian Jew.”
“I thought ‘Polynesian’ was just a delicious chicken nugget sauce! And what kind of name is ‘Taika Waititi?’ It’s like all the ugly parts of the alphabet had a child,” Hitler bellows in the video.
For those who haven’t seen the meme before, the clip is originally from the Oscar-nominated 2004 film “Downfall,” in which actor Bruno Ganz plays Hitler in his last days near the end of World War II. People online then took “Downfall’s” climactic scene — where a furious Hitler erupts in German — and replaced the subtitles with, well … whatever they pleased. Many of the videos were pulled because of copyright claims from the film’s studio, but the meme still persists to this day.
Waititi stars in “Jojo Rabbit” as an imaginary version of Hitler as dreamed up by a boy living in Nazi Germany during the war. The film is described as an “anti-hate satire” and also stars Scarlett Johansson, Rebel Wilson, Sam Rockwell, Alfie Allen, Stephan Merchant, Roman Griffin Davis and Thomasin McKenzie.
“Jojo Rabbit” opens in theaters Oct. 18. Watch the video meme below:
— Jojo Rabbit (@jojorabbitmovie) July 26, 2019