Classic Films - Episode 5

So, I missed posting a WIP for Wednesday morning. I ended up working 8 nights in a row last week, and I pretty much slept from Monday morning when I got home through Wednesday afternoon when I went back to work. I do have some WIP stuff to post for next week though. And I will not be working those kind of crazy hours again any time soon. =D So anyways, on to today's planned blog post. It's another film discussion based on what my husband has been watching with our (older) kids. He does have the younger ones sit out when the film is not appropriate for younger viewers. Anyways, no more rambling for me. Here's his post...

Episode 5 – Schindler’s List

This week’s film should probably viewed by everyone at least once. It’s a powerful film and I seriously debated letting my kids watch it. The youngest one wasn’t there so I felt it would be okay. The film I’m talking about here is Schindler’s List. It’s a three and a half hour epic following a group of large ensemble cast of Jews who survive the holocaust through their employment with Oscar Schindler, a war profiteer who kept his Jewish employees safe from the death camps. It’s based on a true story and it’s a hard film to watch.

Directed by Steven Speilberg, this historical drama, is probably one of the most heart-wrenching films I have ever seen on the holocaust. It also doesn’t glorify the Jewish victims but rather shows them at both their best and worst. I had to explain the history to my kids before we watched. Although we have briefly covered recent American history, they have not had a thorough study of WWII. My eldest is just now entering that chapter in history.

The film actually begins when the Polish and German Jews are herded into ghettos where they must live in cramped rooms with one another. It follows them as they are forced out and moved into work camps where living conditions are even worse. Many, except those who find shelter in Schindler’s factory, are then shipped out to the camps. The film ends with the end of the war and the release of the Jews at Schindler’s factory. All along the way we see them stripped of their belongings, their dignity, and eventually their lives.

I have to say the cleansing of the ghetto scene is perhaps one of the most elegant and awful scene in the entire film. We listen to classical music as the Germans move from house to house executing anyone they find. There’s a long shot of the ghetto in which we see lights flashing in the windows across the town and its beautiful and frightening as we think about how each flash is probably the death of someone.

There are a few main characters. You have Schindler played by Liam Neeson who begins as a womanizing profiteer. He’s charming and genteel but he’s also clearly looking to benefit from the war. He gives an offer to several Jewish investors to lend him the money to start a factory and he will pay them in goods bought from the factory profits. When they argue that it isn’t a good deal, which it isn’t, he tells them that they have absolutely no power to get anything better. He’s right and they know it.

The Jews eventually lend Schindler his money. He then builds a factory and mans it using Jewish labor, first from the ghetto and later from the camps, because he doesn’t have to pay them real salaries. Schindler is assisted by a skilled Jewish accountant played by the Ben Kinglsey who helps Schindler turn his factory into a money-making success. Eventually, Schindler becomes sympathetic towards his Jewish employees and the other Jews at the camp. When he discovers they are being shipped out to death camps, he bribes the local officials using all of his ill-gotten gains to keep a little over a thousand Jews as “workers” for his factory. He ends the film penniless but managed to save a large number of Jews.

That’s the main story. The film itself is full of more vignettes than anything else. It has little scenes that give us a picture of everyday life for the Jewish people under the Nazi regime. People use ice cycles on a train in order to have water to drink, they are forced to run naked in the open, hide in outhouses to avoid being shipped away, and so forth. One scene shows a woman telling a story of how a group of women were shaved and put into a shower were they were gassed to death. We later see these same women get shaved and shoved into a shower where they stand terrified until the water comes on. The movie is filled with little scenes and moment that give us a picture of the terror, despair, and dehumanization that occurred during the holocaust.

One of my sons remarked that he felt bad for the people on the screen and how they were being treated. He said it made him want to cry. I told him that was a good thing because it shows that he cares and that he has a good heart. While America has had its fair share of terrible history and how it has treated minority groups, it’s important to remember the bad so that it doesn’t ever happen again.

There’s a lot to talk about with this film. It doesn’t really give us a lot of the historical context so we spent some time talking about the rise of Nazi Germany and the general attitude of the people at the time towards the Jews. I personally feel that this is a sure sign of God’s providence. No other people group has been has hated throughout history as the Jews and yet they are still with us. If God didn’t intervene then they would have been destroyed long ago.

We spent a little bit talking history and religion. We’re supposed to identify with Schindler but it’s a little awkward since he’s kind of a jerk and his scenes are spread thinly throughout the film. As such, the movie makes it hard to really identify with any one character so it is more of a starting off point for discussion about the holocaust in general. Next week, we’ll watch a comedy to balance out the depressing aspect of this film.