For years it’s been a staple of the TV sketch comedy programs to take a classic piece of foreign film footage and apply to it a set of completely unrelated, hopefully funny, English subtitles.

In the age of YouTube it’s easier than ever for all of us to generate topical, hopefully funny, content using this method.

A year or two back someone had the idea of taking a particularly tense scene from a film called Downfall (Der Untergang) which was all about the final days of Adolf Hitler. In the particular scene they chose Hitler is ranting, tearing shreds off his cronies from the Third Reich. So it’s perfect fodder for incongruous subtitles to make Hitler look and sound ridiculous.

Since that first parody was launched on YouTube there have been hundreds and hundreds more with Hitler seen ranting about pretty well anything you can think of from finding that someone’s stolen his car, to discovering there’s no Santa to being banned from Xbox live.

More recently these parodies have seen people from different countries using that vision as the vehicle to quickly comment on topical, everyday issues from sport to technology and  politics to pop culture. Here are a few title examples:

• Hitler finds out St Kilda lost the grand final
• Hitler finds out Sarah Palin resigns
• Blu Ray has won
• Hitler finds out Lampard is signing for Inter
• Real estate downfall
• Hitler finds out Kanye West disses Taylor swift
• Hitler finds out Pokemon aren’t real
• St Choke (NRL reference)
• Hitler gets angry Manchester United won again
• Hitler finds out about Usain Bolt winning
• Hitler plans to upgrade to Windows 7

Inevitably there had to be “Hitler rants about Hitler parodies”:

The people from surfinglife.com.au have created their own branded version entitled Hitler’s surf trip ruined. Who knows how many other brands might follow suit?

Some clips are better than others but for me the fascinating thing about them is that the more of them you watch the funnier they are.  As you become familiar with the sheepish looks from Hitler’s goons the more you look forward to seeing what the writer will come up with to match that discomfort. It is a little bit Groundhog Day but not annoyingly so.

This is another good example of simple ways people are making technology their own to share opinions and have some fun.

Alan Kewley is an Account Director at BCM Brisbane

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