Shoah (1985)

User Rating:

7.6/10   

Director:

Claude Lanzmann

Release Date:

November 1985 (USA)

Genre:

Documentary

Plot:

Claude Lanzmann directed this 9 1/2 hour documentary of the Holocaust without using a single frame of archive footage...

Plot Keywords:

Holocaust | Jew | Nazi | Poland | WWII

Awards:

13 wins

Cast

Simon Srebnik	...	Himself
Michael Podchlebnik	...	Himself
Motke Zaidl	...	Himself
Hanna Zaidl	...	Herself
Jan Piwonski	...	Himself
Itzhak Dugin	...	Himself
Richard Glazer	...	Himself
Paula Biren	...	Herself
Pana Pietyra	...	Herself
Pan Filipowicz	...	Himself
Pan Falborski	...	Himself
Abraham Bomba	...	Himself
Czeslaw Borowi	...	Himself
Henrik Gawkowski	...	Himself
Rudolf Vrba	...	Himself

Runtime:

Sweden:544 min (25 fps) | UK:566 min | USA:503 min

Country:

France

Language:

English | German | Hebrew | Polish | Yiddish | French

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

Australia:PG | South Korea:12 | Sweden:11

Filming Locations:

Auschwitz, Poland

Company:

Historia

Movie Connections:

Referenced in "Gilmore Girls: Tippecanoe and Taylor, Too (#5.4)" (2004)

wailing

i have only watched the first disc and i wanted to cry and pull my hair and tear my clothing and wail out loud. i am not Jewish nor am i related to any survivors or victims. i have known many people with the tattoos, as i am the same age as most of them. they are all dead now. i am not, esp. in my heart.

first, i thought that it was visually beautiful. i had a visceral reaction when the director was insistent even to the point of bullying the cast. i worried that if they began to relive it all they would come undone and cry and wail for the rest of their lives, not be able to stop. on disc 1, though, the emotion ran high but no one lost control. perhaps something inside them is flat, just to survive.

i thought this was an excellent portion of a film. i think the idea of getting all the survivors on tape before it is too late was a great one. i think the topic should not be avoided since there is genocide going on periodically all over the world. are the people who know the history of the holocaust then to intervene so that history will not be repeated or will we stand by? one thing i sensed strongly from the little bit i saw was the position that the townspeople or people in general who were not targets were in. i always thought they should have 'done something' but now i see 'what could they have done? they would have been murdered. along with their families, with total impunity. it would seem that the Nazis controlled everything and everyone at that time and place. even those who were not direct targets were victims in a way and have had to live with what they saw and their own helpless guilt. Carole/wannadance