Wednesday, April 22, 2009

Holocaust Remembrance Day and Movies

Yesterday, to celebrate that day, I watched Schindler's List on HBO. It is still a powerful movie 16 years later. In 1993 & in Singapore, I remember seeing it with a Chinese audience that found funny the scene where children hid in the latrines' septic tanks.

Schindler's List should be shown every year on Yom HaShoah as the Ten Commandments with Charlton Heston are shown every Easter weekend in the US. It should also be beamed via satellite to every household in Iran and Arab countries as well.

I did noticed in the final credits a Ruth Farhi paying the role of an "Old Jewish Woman". Since they were so many, I could not identify her. A quick check on Google indicated that she also played in many Israeli films including the Syrian Bride. On Les Fleurs main tree, we have two Ruth née Farhi of similar age (Ruth Hai and Ruth Asher).

A year or so ago, I saw a documentary (Inheritance, 2006) about the daughter of Amon Göth (the SS Commander of the Płaszów Camp who was hanged after the war) and his last mistress who had passed away in 1980. After her mother's death, Monika Göth discovered her father's war history. The documentary related her efforts to meet a Jewish slave (Helen Jonas) who shared the Göth house with her mother. They both traveled to Plaszów to meet. A very moving story.

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