YouTube cuts Hitler spoofs

DOWNFALL, a German film released in 2004 about Hitler’s last days, was adapted for wildly popular YouTube parodies that spanned mock rants about topics as varied as playing Xbox video games to Kanye West to Apple’s new iPad.

Every spoof is from the same scene in the film: A furious, defeated Hitler, played by Bruno Ganz, unleashes an impassioned, angry speech to his remaining staff in his underground bunker.

On Tuesday, the clips on YouTube, many of which had been watched by hundreds of thousands, began disappearing from the site. Constantin Films, the company that owns the rights to the film, asked for them to be removed, and YouTube complied.