What's one worth to you?

Rating: 10/10 (19 September 2015)

Spielberg once stated that Schindler's List is not about the millions that were killed during the Holocaust, but rather about the one thousand that were saved. It's a very important thing to consider when looking at some of the criticisms levelled at this great film. There have been documentaries that have attempted to capture the atrocities of the Holocaust but even so none come close to the unflinching and systematic mass murder of the event. Schindler's List doesn't attempt to provide an substantial and unbiased view of it. It is a story about one man in particular and his absolute good.
Even so, the film does attempt to place itself within the reality of the events and create some sense of authenticity. Apart from the powerful bookends which are drenched in colour, the black and white documentary approach serves its agelessness and heightens the intensity of some scenes; the first look we get at the enigma of Oskar Schindler, catch-lights hitting his twinkling eyes at the party, or when a little boy attempts to hide in the underground box full of sewerage. Hand- held is also used intensively and to great effect - the rounding up of naked Jews, the extended liquidation scene, scrambling around the camp in madness in avoiding a psychopath with a sniper rifle. Spielberg doesn't overdose the film with visual tricks but shows it for what it is (the lack of storyboarding aided this), making those little touches all the more effective - quick match cuts to show the various inept secretaries that are hired anyway, Kingley's distant voice-over as Goeth executes lined up boys silently and mercilessly, and the most powerful motif of them all, the girl in the red coat, a symbol of innocence lost and atrocity committed.
There are two exceptional performances here. The first is of course Neeson, who brings to the table a great charisma and pragmaticism that later dissolves into sympathy and great courage. We first are charmed like the German officers at the party (I love the great touch of the officer moving forward to get closer to Oskar in the photo, obscuring the pretty girl he was initially wooing), and through voice-over and a photo we receive those charms again through the lavish gifts of champagne, caviar and sardines. Spielberg does not create a moment of realisation or change; it is a gradual and subtle process that Oskar goes through. He is not the morally pure and idealistic man we look for in a Hollywood production such as this - he initially hires an entire group of secretaries not to save them, but to further his womanising and marital affairs, and when a one-armed man comes to thank him for saving his life, Neeson's face is struck and visibly confused; we wonder if he has ever been the receiver of such sincerity and gratitude. But that changes when he realises the gravity of the situation ("He was a metal press operator"). Oskar's front is of course the affable German business man, concerned only about profit, but in glimpses he shows his true humanity and courage in front of the Nazis: a long kiss on his birthday, a determination to see worker's thirsts quenched, and in that final teary-eyed heart wrenching monologue, a complete reversal of his ambitions. John Williams' iconic violin theme is stirring and most evident here.
The other is Fiennes' Goeth, who takes a despicable monster and adds tiny tinges of humanity that make his character all the more terrifying. His introduction is telling, a faceless POV in the back of the car before we reveal him, not some intimidating figure, but an irritated man with a cold: "Ja, why is the top down? I'm f*cking freezing." Another one of these moments is a brilliant scene where he corners Helen in the baseless, shivering and terrified. Goeth ignores this, constructing a rather tender conversation in his mind, and we witness a insatiable conflict in his mind, unbelieving that he has fallen for a "jew bitch". He almost gives in, but his Nazi sensibilities come back to him and he strikes her. This segment is brilliantly inter cut with kisses of another location, the modest Jewish wedding and the lavish birthday party where Oskar kisses many. This man is truly barbaric, and even a clever appeal to his ego from Oskar ("I pardon you.") does not satisfy his cold murderous streak. What Fiennes does is give us a tiny bit of insight into a man like Goeth, because to us it seems inexplicable that such a man could do such sadistic things and be instrumental in genocide. And so, he loses Helen over a game of 21. They bargain over the life of these essential jew workers, and Goeth's question to Schindler is perhaps a moment of realisation of what he must do.
One little moment in the montage of compiling the list is a overlooked appearance from another Righteous Among the Nations, Julius Madritsch, who save thousands of Jews himself. I am struck by how his story and many others could similarly be rightfully portrayed as a compelling act of bravery in the face of such evil, much like Oskar Schindler's. His story was almost never told; a fateful encounter between writer Thomas Keneally and a Schindler's Jew in Poldek Pfefferberg was the basis of a book and later this film. Pfefferberg's own words are particularly telling about this great man: "Schindler gave me my life, and I tried to give him immortality." And in this film, he has achieved it.