Appreciate it - but do so for the right reasons

Rating: 10/10 (7 September 1999)

Steven Spielberg was wrong about the subject matter of his own film. It's no more `about' the holocaust than it's `about' Eastern Europe. It's about Oscar Schindler. More to the point: it's about an amoral small-time capitalist with neither more nor less compassion than most other people, who finds himself as surprised as anyone when cruel and unusual circumstances mould him into a hero. It's about a man led to the path of morality as much by his belly as by his heart. It's a study in the banality of goodness. I don't know how many other people have used that phrase, but there's no better way of putting it.
It's the job of documentaries, not fiction, to teach us about the past. `Schindler's List' is not a lesson about the what happened to European Jews under Nazi rule - at any rate, it's not a particularly good lesson. It's fiction. I'm not, of course, saying that it's false - I gather most of it is true. Nor am I saying that it can't teach us a lesson of another kind. When Superman saves a thousand people we can always say, `That's all very well, but I can't leap tall buildings in a single bound; and anyway, Superman is supernaturally virtuous.' When someone as flawed as Oscar Schindler saves a thousand people it's not so easy to make excuses.
There's a good story here. Many people do some of their best work in telling it. I don't think that Neeson, Fiennes or Spielberg have ever performed better than they do here, and John Williams writes fine music in an understated style he hasn't used for a while. But it's really the story that makes the movie. Spielberg, in thinking that he's making a kind of documentary, sometimes lets the story down - every single use of colour is an intrusion, and anyone who's read the book will find that sections have been transferred flatly, with a palette knife, to the screen. Probably this film has been praised a little more than it deserves. Oh, well. Excess praise will be washed away with time.
One minor point: when the book was first published in Australia, it was called `Schindler's Ark'. `Schindler's List' is the (inferior) American title. Sadly, after the success of the film the book was called `Schindler's List' even here. Spielberg could have called his film `Schindler's Monocle' - or anything at all - and publishers would have dutifully re-named the book. It's a pity he didn't use his power to restore the original title.