Only a true cynic will mistake this for sentimentalist crap

Rating: 9/10 (24 June 2012)

Schindler's list to this day stands out for being one of the most impressive movies made about the Holocaust.
Spielberg went the extra mile in every aspect of this movie. Superior cinematography, lots of historical references (which, although not always completely accurate, give a good sense of what the holocaust was like for the Jews), brilliant actors, brilliant score, amazing screenplay.
People have criticized it for being too sentimental, and I can understand their problems with that, but I can't agree with them. The subject matter is still one of the darkest periods in living history.
Now we have a film like "Der Untergang" which shows the story from inside the Nazi high command at the end of the war, and that movie is even more haunting than this one. It doesn't focus however on the victimization of the entire Jewish community, and therefore does not have to deal with the emotional burdens of the people who had to live through these conditions.
Another point is that if you want to show the holocaust in a drama film, you have to think of your audience as well. Although many people still know what it was like, there are also large groups of people who haven't got a clue about the war. They heard the figure, 6 million Jews killed in concentration camps, but know nothing about the ghettos, the slave labour, the slow descent from being deprived of the right to have certain jobs, to being murdered just because you are a Jew.
Schindler's list makes this history accessible to the masses. Spielberg does this expertly, by balancing the sentimental with the downright cynical and horrific.
Where a film like Der Untergang focuses more on the human weaknesses of the Nazis, this film poses the Nazis outright as the pure evil that Jews had to deal with in the war. This is a very different approach, that can be classed as a more conventional narrative. Good versus Evil. Oskar Schindler stands alone as the "good German". In reality there were others like him of course, but in the reality the protagonists of this movie faced, those "others" played no part, so it is not necessary for the movie to work to emphasize this.
What more can be said? Well a criticism has also been that the Jews are being portrayed as little more than meek victims, and that no heroism from them is shown. Unfortunately the war didn't offer many heroic opportunities for the Jewish people. There are exceptions to this rule, but most of them suffered without hope, without a chance to fight back. You can look for the exceptions, and criticize Spielberg for not showing that side. Would that be fair on history? Maybe, but let's face it, the exceptions were far and few between, through no fault of the Jews themselves, but because the Nazis had such a firm grip on the Third Reich that a deed of defiance by one hero, could cost the lives of many bystanders who had nothing to do with it. Most Jews simply had to bear every degrading action undertaken against them, and there was nothing they could do about it.
All in all you have to be quite cynical not to be impressed by this movie. It is just too powerful for that. Yes, in the end much is made of making Schindler into a true hero, especially the scene before he flees, where he cries that he could have saved more. Some people hate this scene, and think it schmaltzy, over-sentimental, sanctimoneous crap. I think that it is a great scene, although this scene is very Hollywood, and most probably not an accurate portrayal of the way Schindler fled the factory. But it ends the development of his character, as he finally realises the mistakes he made. He therefore goes from being a cynical crook at the start of the movie, to a man who reluctantly saved people, to a man who enjoys his role as saviour, to finally coming to terms with what he did, and what more he could have done, if he hadn't been busy showing off.
This movie is a true classic. If you can watch it without shedding a tear, please check your heart's temperature, because it probably is frozen solid.