"His story as told by the actual people he saved."
The true story of German-Czech businessman Oskar Schindler (1908-74) as told by some of the Jews — more than a thousand people — whose lives he saved from extermination during World War II.
Dirk Bogarde
Self - Narrator (voice)
Irena Schek
Self - Shoah Survivor
Mojesz Pantirer
Self - Shoah Survivor
Solomon Urbach
Self - Shoah Survivor
Emilie Schindler
Self - Schindler's Wife
Eva Kisza
Self - Schindler's Mistress
Leopold Pfefferberg
Self - Shoah Survivor
Ruth Kalder
Self - Amon Göth's Mistress
Herman Rosner
Self - Shoah Survivor
The true story of German-Czech businessman Oskar Schindler (1908-74) as told by some of the Jews — more than a thousand people — whose lives he saved from extermination during World War II.
Aside from capitalising on an astonishing selection of (sometimes quite harrowing) archive, this documentary also presents us with an insightful array of interviews with many of the survivors of the Nazi persecution of the Jews during the 1940s. Abhorred by the activities of the National Socialists, local industrialist Oskar Schindler manages to convince the authorities that using the Jewish population as disposable manual labour was a better use of their numbers than just sending them to a concentration or labour camps. For a while, this served a dual function in supporting the war machine in a convincing fashion for their oppressors but it also enabled Schindler to systematically smuggle hundreds of people to safety. As the tide of the war started to turn, his abilities - and his own personal security - became compromised as desperation increasingly took over and their situations became even more precarious. The poignant contributions from those who survived adds huge richness to a story of unbelievable cruelty and horrors with some penetrating commentaries supporting the plentiful and potently brutal imagery. What’s also quite interesting here is that it doesn’t paint a picture of Schindler as some sort of saint. Questions are asked about his motivation at the beginning of the war and occasionally throughout as the end of the war exposed him to considerable risk and he had to rely on his erstwhile employees to ensure his escape from the approaching Soviets. His closing years are discussed, though not really illustrated, and they make for really rather sad watching as drink and depression took it’s toll on a man largely reduced to poverty and generous hand-outs. This is an effective and affecting film that tells real stories of real people from their own mouths, with a minimum of speculative third party or narrative extrapolation, and it asks plenty of questions about fear, terror and complicity too.
Five Jewish Hungarians, now US citizens, tell their stories: before March 1944, when Nazis began to exterminate Hungarian Jews, months in concentration camps, and visiting childhood homes more than 50 years later. An historian, a Sonderkommando, a doctor who experimented on Auschwitz prisoners, and US soldiers who were part of the liberation in April 1945.
Dick Proenneke retired at age 50 in 1967 and decided to build his own cabin in the wilderness at the base of the Aleutian Peninsula, in what is now Lake Clark National Park. Using color footage he shot himself, Proenneke traces how he came to this remote area, selected a homestead site and built his log cabin completely by himself. The documentary covers his first year in-country, showing his day-to-day activities and the passing of the seasons as he sought to scratch out a living alone in the wilderness.
A documentary highlighting the Soviet Union's legendary and enigmatic hockey training culture and world-dominating team through the eyes of the team's Captain Slava Fetisov, following his shift from hockey star and celebrated national hero to political enemy.
Oskar Gröning, known as the "Accountant of Auschwitz," was charged with the murder of 300,000 Jews. When he took the stand in 2015, at the age of 94, his trial made headlines worldwide.
An unprecedented and intimate look at the life, work and enduring legacy of British actress Audrey Hepburn (1929-1993).
Produced and presented as evidence at the Nuremberg war crimes trial of Hermann Göring and twenty other Nazi leaders, this film consists primarily of dead and surviving prisoners and of facilities used to kill and torture during the World War II.
The story of the gold-plated statuette that became the film industry's most coveted prize, AND THE OSCAR GOES TO... traces the history of the Academy itself, which began in 1927 when Louis B. Mayer, then head of MGM, led other prominent members of the industry in forming this professional honorary organization. Two years later the Academy began bestowing awards, which were nicknamed "Oscar," and quickly came to represent the pinnacle of cinematic achievement.
An Indonesian man with a communist background named Ramli was brutally murdered when the "Communist" purge occurred in 1965. His remaining family members lived in fear and silence until the making of this documentary. Adi, a brother of his, decided to revisit the horrific incident and visited the men who were responsible for the killings and one survivor of the purge. These meetings uncovered sadistic details of the murders and exposed raw emotions and reactions of the killers' family members about what happened in the past - much to Adi's disappointment.
Learn the incredible behind-the-scenes story of how the original Star Wars movie was brought to the big screen in this fascinating documentary hosted by C-3PO and R2-D2 which includes interviews with George Lucas and appearances by Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford and Carrie Fisher.
Featuring never-before-seen footage, this documentary delivers a startling new look at the Peoples Temple, headed by preacher Jim Jones who, in 1978, led more than 900 members to Guyana, where he orchestrated a mass suicide via tainted punch.