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New York, NY, USA - For veteran New York-based filmmaker Marc Levin making "The Protocols of Zion" was more than just another one in his extensive catalog of controversial, politically charged documentaries. This feature had a deep-seated personal connection for both him and has dad -- as Jews and journalists.
To see the century-old lie of "The Protocols of Zion" (a tract purported to detail the Jews' plot to take over the world, surreptitiously authored by the Russian Czar's secret agents) being promulgated again as a truth to stir a new rash of anti-Semitic activities was appalling, but also intriguing enough for the filmmaker to prompt an investigation. Once their curiosity overtook their disgust, the seeds of this film were sown as they sought answers for why and how the Protocols were reappearing again as a legitimate source of information after having long been discredited.
G21: Explain your motivation behind doing this.
ML: It was a gradual dawning of what I was getting into. I started more simply of hearing these rumors that the Jews were warned. Then when this kid in the cab connected to the Protocols just the idea, I just started with a simple idea of how the hell did this thing come from the trash shoot of history into the conversation and hooked up into 9/11 that the Jews were somehow secretly involved. I have to say it was really the war in Iraq and "The Passion." [Mel's Gibson's fillm "The Passion of Christ".] All these things that happened in the world that then I found myself in the bigger issue. Of the Jews and anti-Semitism. Then as I was finishing on the 3rd anniversary [of the World Trade Center attack] and we went to Ground Zero realizing this is a touchy subject.
G21: How did you research it?
ML: The internet was big but obviously I read everything I could. Probably Constantine's Sword was the most profound book. Written by an ex-priest, it just blew my mind. This certainly made me think that when I started hearing about "The Passion," it had to be a part of the story.
I've been making films for 30 years and I have a lot of contacts in numero us communities. This is the only time I went in and stood in front of the camera and said it's about me. Whether it is the anti-abortion underground or the intelligence community, organized crime, these are worlds I know a little about. I was going into territory that was somewhat familiar but in a way I had never done before.
G21: What was the scariest thing about making this film?
ML: I would say when I was at the radio station in Saint Louis. Obviously some of the scenes on the street get crazy, but I was most disturbed by being there in Middle America. I knew where it was coming from but that radio station had the voices of every perspective so I figured there would be a mix all debating each other. but it was just, "The Jews are this, the Jews are that." [The hate never lets up.]
G21: Doesn't it make you wonder how these people become anti-Semitic?
ML: It is like an alternate universe that people could even think that the world works like this. That's what stuns me. I have included in the film when I went into my attic and found my Kennedy [assassination] stuff. I have a place in my heart that understands conspiracy thinking, but where I've ended up is saying "Look, there is a universal conspiracy. As far as my perception of it, all people in power cover up the truth. They don't want you to know how it works." That's a given.
The little I've been able to glimpse behind how it works, what is really how it works is not like in "JFK," Oliver Stone's film, but what happens is what happened at the Bay of Pigs or the invasion of Iraq. These guys come up with a scheme and it screws up -- they're always wrong -- and they have to cover their tracks. The conspiracy is the cover-up.
I'm willing to say we don't know everything that happened on September 11th. But don't take me back to the garbage of the Czar or the Nazis. Move it forward, man.
G21: Did you read the book on who financed Hitler?
ML: I did. I've read it all. That's why I hit Sean Walker [an ultra-rightist radio talk show host] about the Jewish blood in Hitler. I'm fascinated by it, but my thing is if you want to reveal the truth of things that are going on, then I'm behind you. You don't want to buy the mainstream version, I'm behind you, too. But let's go forward not backwards.
G21: Aren't there grades of conspiracy?
ML: "The Protocols" are so gothic and Byzantine. As many have said, if you get 12 Jews in a room you're going to get 1200 opinions on things. The Protocols are such a monochromatic infantile version [of the Jewish people]. The international Jew now, which is a more interesting -- read for America -- it's got baseball and pornography and music. It's a black hole that can gobble you up, but believe me, some of my close friends have been lost in this world of conspiracy. You can get blinded.
G21: Isn't it an interesting industry?
ML: That world is one I want to get involved with is on the Web. I know the Web is so rich in all this. It is endless. Some are so inventive you can't help smiling and laughing. I think this stuff is fascinating but don't sell it as the facts. Sell it as a metaphor. I think it's a valid and interesting genre.
G21: How did you finance the trips you took to make the film?
ML: I raised a budget for the film. People were open and interested in what I laid out. I'd be the first to admit there were some wealthy Jewish individuals that were nervous and said they didn't want to go near this. There were others that were supportive but felt if I kept the name "The Protocols of Zion" that they couldn't invest because there would be some kids that would go out there and pick up the book out of curiosity. But I had to take that risk. I think that it is outweighed by trying to shine a light on all of this. So we were able to raise financing independently.
G21: How did you edit this movie?
ML: You don't stop. This film is like Catechism 101 but it just has the opening questions. It's just a preamble. If this is going to last like the Cold War did, just think about the early '50s. I feel that I needed to get my bearings. I honestly do believe then and I do believe now that the world did change in some fundamental way. There's a realignment of some kind from the tragedy of 9/11.
The world that I grew up to anticipate is not the same now. We woke up to a new world . If I was a child in the '60s from the year of Aquarius, I never thought we were going to wake up in the new Middle Ages with religious warfare and fanatics of faith hijacking history. I would be the first to admit these are the first feeble steps out of that first shock and trying to make sense in it. There's a long way to go.
G21: How did you decide to end the movie?
ML: That was hard. My father was not in the first cut of the film. It was only that after people saw it, that my friends said it was an overdose of hate. You're so numb you can't talk, you can't think. We needed a little more of other things in this film. My editor said that over a weekend. He kind of dug into some of the stuff that is hot with my father, and he showed it to me and said take a look and I had to let go.
G21: How old is your dad?
ML: He's going to be 80. My old man is amazing, just amazing. I love him tremendously. He is a extraordinary character and I wanted to capture him when he was still able to go into a maximum security prison [where a former skinhead Nazi now preaches against racism and anti-Semitism]. When he was still on his game.
G21: Do you think you'll explore how the guy became a skinhead who then found God and turned against racism as a future film?
ML: I'm encouraging my father to write. His story with that guy goes so far; not only did he become born again but my father is like his rabbi.
They are close, and Eric is now engaged to a Black social worker. His musical career in prison -- he's in prison for life -- led him to Wynton Marsalis. [The famed jazz musician] went to the prison and jammed with Eric. This is a remarkable story.
I'm trying to get my father to write it. Eric Daniels was busted for writing a 200-dollar bad check. He was put in prison with maximum-security prisoners and drafted into the White Brotherhood, given the Protocols to learn from and ended up with this murder rap. He went from writing a bad check to the white power brotherhood to being involved in a murder and now, he's turned around. It amazes me.
G21: What other areas would you like to explore further?
ML: Well we had a running gag about the Jihad of Jersey. You don't need to go anywhere else, its all right here. How the street world collides with religious fanaticism fascinates me. Also,[what's going on] inside the heart of someone who is not a believer in a world surrounded by true believers. Even in your own home with your wife. Those are the basic ingredients we were working with.
G21: Do you think that new documentary filmmakers are the new counter-culture heroes?
ML: I love that idea. Someone else said to me it's the WTF nature of documentaries ["what the fuck"]. I think the idea that the indie doc is not as easy to turn into a formula and commodity has somehow kept it as [a source of] an authentic indie spirit so that only I could make this film, and only Michael Moore could have made "Fahrenheit 9/11" and so forth.
The feature way is the minor leagues to draft you into commercials and TV. [But with] the doc world, no one still doesn't know what to do with it. Who would have thought that when you have 500 cable stations that the marketplace would be open to what does it mean. People say, "Look, this is how I put it together." It's just a subjective personal journey.
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