Schindler’s List was originally released in 1993. The movie directed by Steven Spielberg received seven Oscars, it had excellent reviews so it is hard to write anything new about the movie but I will try – from the position of my Polish origin.
The main hero of the movie is Oscar Schindler – a Nazi officer, gambler, womanizer, who was used to look for fun and money only. But the same Schindler was a right person in a right time and in a right place.
During the World War II he ended up in Kraków. In his factory he desperately tried to protect Jews who were working for him. He used bribes and any other possible methods to save their lives in spite of being arrested twice in the effect. In the effect he saved about 1,200 Polish Jews. At the end of the war when Germans dissolve Plaszów, a labor camp where many some Jews who worked for Schindler lived – he was able to persuade Nazi to move the factory to Czech Brunnitz saving his Jewish workers again. On the way there – one train with women was re-routed to Auschwitz. Schindler saved their lives. It was the only shipment with alive people – back from Auschwitz. Schindler was honored with Yad Vashem. This award was established by Israel in 1953 to honor the righteous gentiles who saved lives of Jews.
This film, although it takes place in Poland does not really talk about Poles or if it talks – only in a very marginal and negative sense. Poland seen through this movie is just a place of Jewish Holocaust. Poles are showed either as guards in the camps or as Nazi prostitutes. This is really a big simplification considering that Auschwitz itself was built and served first as the concentration camp for Polish political prisoners.
Poland was a country where Jews lived more or less peacefully but definitively in better conditions than somewhere else for hundreds of years. This is one of the reasons why Holocaust was setup by Nazi at Poland, more Jews lived in Poland than anywhere else in Europe.
During World War II Poles and other Eastern European were treated much more badly than Western Europeans by Nazi. In Poland, six millions people vanished as a consequence of World War II – three millions were Jews and three millions were non-Jews. Poles were punished with death for helping Jews – so if they helped they were real heroes not only “righteous” as Yad Vashem implicates.
In spite of the danger there were more Poles honored with Yad Vashem award that any other nationality.
Do następnego razu… (Till next time…)
Comments:
William Szych:
I just watched this again after not seeing it since it came out. It was a ground breaking film which showed one of the many, many horrors imposed upon Poland by both Germany and the Soviet Union. These are above and beyond the horrors that are always are inflicted when men have warred with one another and include: indiscriminate and brutal mass murdering, mass enslavement, mass rapes, looting and wanton physical destruction and desecration, stealing of children, and the overall mayhem and terror and torture. The very blackest pages of history! I pray that all living victims find peace and be healed and that all 6 miilion or more souls that were murdered rest in eternal peace and that perpetual light shine upon them. Some very good films like Katyn have been made since then but the true story is yet to be fully told in a major film. The good news is that through Facebook groups like “The Way Back — The Untold Story of WWII Poland” one can begin to fathom how terribly the Polish people suffered and how noble they were in fighting for their freedom — which did not come until 1989.
Marie Reimers:
Thank you, Kasia. The Poles while having been victims so many times throughout history – and especially in the last century, have remained strong, faith-filled, kind and generous. I agree that not enough attention has been paid to their own sacrifices and suffering.
John:
A good book to read about this is “Microcosm” by Norman Davies and Roger Moorhouse. It is mostly about Wroclaw but describes the war years, death camps, and war crimes. Hitler once said that no German will ever be executed, or prosecuted, for murdering any Polish “swinehunds.” There were hundreds of death camps, work camps (death camps with different names), and prisons in Poland, and other Eastern Europe countries. The difference with Aushwitz, according to Davies, is that over 1.5 million Jews were immediately walked from the trains to the gas chambers and never stepped foot in Auschwitz. It is incomprehensible to anyone what everyone went through in those years and how anyone escaped to tell about it.
John:
PS. In response to Marie’s comment, you are correct. I am always completely in awe that so much destruction and so many peoples’ lives were such disastrously destroyed in both the war and afterwards in all countries, especially the eastern block. The arbitrary murders, forced relocations, executions, etc. are still unbelievable. I often ask people if they realize how immensely lucky they are alive today after what their ancestors experienced.