Image Before My Eyes (1981)

Using historical footage, still photographs, and live interviews, the filmmaker tells the story of Jewish life in Poland between the two World Wars. Includes scenes of urban and rural life,... See full summary »

Director:

Joshua Waletzky

Writers:

Jerome Badanes, Lucjan Dobroszycki (book),

Storyline

Using historical footage, still photographs, and live interviews, the filmmaker tells the story of Jewish life in Poland between the two World Wars. Includes scenes of urban and rural life, and covers the rise and flourishing of the many religious and secular economic, political, and social movements which characterized Jewish society at this time. Film is a broad survey rather than focusing on any particular sub-topic. Notable in that it deals with the vibrancy of the life of this population of 3.5 million, and not with the tragedy of its subsequent destruction.

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Plot Keywords:

independent film | based on book

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Genres:

Documentary

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Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

19 March 1981 (USA)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Yivo Institute for Jewish Research

Technical Specs

Runtime:

90 min

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Black and White Color

User Reviews

Excellent historical documentary on the Jewish people of Poland.

This is an excellent historical - visual and aural - documentary of the Jewish people of eastern Europe, but primarily Poland, during the years between World Wars I and II. The film captures the village and city lives of the Polish Jews during this time, their families, culture, languages (Yiddish, Hebrew, etc.), politics, hardships, accomplishments, dreams, and desires. It represents a portion of European (and international) history of 3.5 million people of which only 250 thousand (seven percent) survived Hitler's Germany. The film is supplemented throughout with interviews with several men and women who lived as children during this period. They share their memories, songs, language, and assessments of their Jewish lives, families, relatives, and communities. The film also illustrates not only their allegiance to their Jewish faith but, at the same time, in many cases their strong, patriotic feelings and loyalty to their country whether it be Poland, Russia, Germany, or Austria.