The Waldheim waltz

THE WALDHEIM WALTZ is about truth and lies or “alternative facts”. About individual and collective consciousness. “Waldheim no!” shouts a crowd in the centre of Vienna in 1986. Ruth Beckermann was one of the activists trying to prevent the election of Kurt Waldheim and documented the political events. The film shows the tangled web that former UN Secretary General became ensnared in by concealing two years of his wartime biography, the swift succession of new allegations by the World Jewish Congress against him, the denial by the Austrian political class, the outbreak of anti-Semitism and patriotism, which finally led to his election.