Reviewing Movies

He was a profiteer, a philanderer, a confidence man, a racketeer; but to the thousand or so Jews whose forced labour he exploited he was a saint. Such is the paradox that is Oscar Schindler. When the Nazi’s decided to liquidate the Jewish Ghetto in Krakow with the help of a Jewish accountant Schindler used the hidden wealth of several hundred Jewish families to buy an enamel factory and then acquired the forced labour of those same prisoners to work that factory. Using the wealth generated by his slave labour force Schindler managed to bribe Nazi officialdom repeatedly when the other members of the camp were sent to liquidation centres even managing to retrieve a group of his female staff from the bowels of Auschwitz itself. That his Jewish plant manager was the brains behind the operation was made clear when all his later enterprises ended in bankruptcy. During his later years he was supported by his Schindler Survivors whose antecedents now number over 6000.

The parallels between Schindler played by Liam Neeson and the camp commandant played by Ralf Fiennes are many: their appearance, their love of music, culture, fine wines, woman, luxury, high living. But while the commandant stands on his balcony with a rifle and picks off recalcitrant camp workers Schindler seeks to save their lives. The shower scene in Auschwitz is enough to make the blood run cold—one expects to see the gas pellets drop.

With only a few exceptions used for dramatic effect the movie is shot in black and white. The beautiful music that serves as background contrasts dramatically with the savage events on screen. In an effecting epilogue a hundred or so actual Schindler survivors come forward and place pebbles on Schindler’s grave.