Black and White

Rating: 1/10 (24 April 1999)

I've watched this film about half a dozen times over the last five years and I still don't really understand what Spielberg was trying to do. Was he trying to outline the horrors of the holocaust or was he trying to examine Schindler himself - why the man did what he did? Maybe both. In neither case does he succeed. One can't help but feel the atrocities were greatly toned down for this film thus not really reflecting the true horror of what really happened, and he fails completely in exploring the character of Schindler. Why did Schindler do what he did? The man was a philanderer and a shrewd business man who didn't exactly go out of his way to be nice. Did witnessing what he did make him wake up to himself or perhaps there was an ulterior motive? Spielberg looks at none of this and serves up a modern day saint. It is kind of ironic that Spielberg shot this movie in black and white because that is the approach he has taken to his subject material. He gives us the saintly Schindler, the stereotypical evil Nazi, the honourable Jew and none of the complexities that made these people what they are. This was Spielberg's attempt to become accepted as a serious film-maker but yet he takes exactly the same approach to making this as he did with his marvellous popcorn movies resulting in a rather dictatorial film that has more answers than questions!