I will never forget this film

Rating: 10/10 (5 July 1999)

Human beings are the only species that kills for sport and hunts for pleasure. We may be the only species ( next to a cat ) that takes joy in killing and torturing another person or animal. Why God gave us the capacity to experience these heinous emotions and desires is beyond me. But for whatever reason, we do have them, and the Holocaust is one of the darkest periods in our existence as human beings. There certainly are other dark times but this one is the most talked about and famous. And before I saw this film, I knew the Holocaust was horrible, but when you can put visuals to the words, it gives you a whole new appreciation and understanding of what is one disgusting display of inhumanity towards a people. And from a man that gave us films like Jaws and Close Encounters of the Third Kind, many may have not expected to see a masterpiece like this. But no one should ever be surprised at what Spielberg can accompish.
Schindler's List gives you the horror right in your mind. It paints pictures in front of you and you cringe with every stroke of cinematic genius that is presented before you. I felt sad and disgusted to watch the horrors before me. It made me sick to see that humans could be so cruel. Do we not have any compassion towards the living? Apparently not. And this film shows that, along with Mississippi Burning, Platoon, Saving Private Ryan and even pictures like Boyz N The Hood, we are a sad creation and one that whoever is the supreme ruler of us has got to be angry at the way we turned out.
This is one of the most important films ever made and it also one of the most disturbing. I walked out of the theater and when we drove home there was four of us ) not one word was uttered for at least a half an hour. It was like it took us that long to process what we had just witnessed. When the converstion did start, it went deep into the night and early into the morning. It will provoke that kind of reaction from most everybody.
As important and as brilliant of a film as this is ( I rate it a ten out of ten ) I only saw it once at the theater and then only through the most persistant of begging, once more on video four years later. It disturbed me too much. The images were too real for me and it gave me nightmares for a few days later. What Spielberg has done here is not only make an important film, he has taken a subject that causes so many people pain and he has opened it up for the rest of us to understand. And for that, no Oscar can ever repay him for his contribution to society. I know I am a changed person because of this film. And to me, Saving Private Ryan could have almost been an unofficial sequel to Schindler's List. They both have opened my eyes to the horrors that mankind has caused.
Schindler's List and Saving Private Ryan are proof that Speilberg is the king of Hollywood. I sincerely hope he makes an Indy 4, but I hope he continues to make films that make us think. Because he is damn good at those ones too.