Aside from the mass murder, was Himmler a decent chap?

ONE OF t he odder rituals of the family holiday is the visit to a museum. Maybe it’s the action of sunshine on the grey cells. Maybe it’s t he after- effects of l ast night’s retsina or limoncello.

But unless you’ve had the foresight to book yourself into a resort with enough sunbeds and free nibbles to ensure you never leave the poolside, you will inevitably feel impelled one morning, while taking a stroll through the town, to acquire some culture. And you go into the museum.

It might be dedicated to a writer you’ve never read, or a painter you’ve never much liked. But no sooner have you said, ‘Come on, this looks interesting,’ than you’ve bought a guidebook and a fistful of tickets, and you’re in a gloomy room staring at an indeterminate object in a glass cabinet.

After a couple of minutes, when the sunshine and the hangover have worn off, you realise two things: there is nothing in here worth seeing, and the tickets cost you more than a West End show.

Later, you’ll admit it was a rip-off. But right now, it’s imperative that you get your money’s worth. And the only chance of doing that is to watch the documentary.

There’s always a film in these places playing on a loop, usually consisting of black- and- white photos projected on to a wall, with narration in a language you don’t speak. But you’ve paid, so you pile on to benches to watch from the middle to the end, and then from the beginning to the middle.

Storyville (BBC4) recreated that sensation with its 90-minute documentary about the bureaucratic sadist who created the Nazi concentration camps, Heinrich Himmler.

Archive footage and the SS Reichsfuhrer’s own diaries were presented in a clumsy, amateurish muddle, without proper editing. There was no sense of what mattered and what was irrelevant.

Without any expert commentary, viewers had only the subtitles as a guide, while actors read in German from Himmler’s private papers. Nothing was explained — all the context had to be surmised.

Some of the film clips might have been fascinating. One piece of footage was shot on a river boat, with a swastika flying from the stern and four unknown men relaxing on deck. When one turned and looked into the camera, we realised with a jolt he was Adolf Hitler.

But there was no way of knowing when this was filmed, who the other men were, or why they were on a boat.

A caption at the start informed us that Allied soldiers had looted Himmler’s house in 1945 and stolen the papers. We never found out how these letters and journals ended up on our screens.

There were moments that spoke for themselves, such as a photo of Himmler aged ten, already wearing his trademark round-rimmed glasses. We learned that he numbered all his love letters, and that his nickname for his wife was ‘Rascal’. She called him ‘Naughty Man’.

But mostly we were left guessing. Why, f or instance, was this documentary subtitled ‘Himmler: The Decent One’? Several leading Nazis, including him, posed as ‘decent’ family men, but it was obvious he saw himself as a ruthless idealist who had to do evil things.

Perhaps the film-makers meant that, mass murder and psychosis aside, Himmler lived a banal life. But like everything else, they didn’t make it clear.

Safe House (ITV) is making very little clear either. Half the scenes are shot through rippling glass, or underwater. The dialogue is obliterated by a pianist apparently playing at the bottom of a well, and striking the keys with hammers.

After two episodes, it appears we’re meant to feel as if we’re in a nightmare, where danger lurches out at us without warning.

Christopher Eccleston, as the retired policeman trying to hide a family from a bloodthirsty stalker, was always standing on a cliff edge or running through the mist, when he wasn’t trying to swim Lake Windermere fully clothed.

There’s nothing amateurish about Safe House. The cast is strong, the landscapes impressive. It just doesn’t make very much sense. Like a bunch of gullible tourists, ITV has wasted its money.