The magic trick of Schindler's list

Rating: 10/10 (21 April 2017)

It was the perfect story, the perfect backdrop to show the un-showable, to reveal the horror of horrors and Spielberg knew it. This man Schindler, this vain, greedy, con man, his transformation from a nobody trying to scheme the system, into one of the great heroes of modern times, is the magic trick that delivers the movie. How did it happen, how did this man of all people, throw a fortune away, and risk life and limb in the very heart of evil, that is the question. So many did nothing, so many did evil in the name of duty, so few heroes, but there were heroes, heroes of the type that saved humanity by showing even under the worst possible circumstances, mankind has the capacity to rise to the occasion. Evil is in abundance, and Schindler is outnumbered, but many heroes emerged in the holocaust, not just Schindler, many hid Jews, many spirited Jews to safety but few were as outnumbered and at the very heart of the holocaust as Schindler. How do you protect, and keep 1,100 people from being murdered, and do it all out in the open, only the best conman could have done it, its almost as if Schindler trained his whole life, all his cons, all his act and charisma finely tuned, just so he could pull off the greatest scheme of them all, tricking the Nazi's out of 1,100 Jewish souls.
While Schindler and Goth battle it out miles above the Jews like New Gods, one with the complete power of life and death over the Jews, the other working as hard as he can to save them. It is Itzhak Stern ( Ben Kingsley who is superb) who is the soul of the movie, the classy and dignified Stern is a Jewish man who overnight has lost his rights to be called human, the Nazis have stripped him of everything but that humanity, which he somehow manages to cling to.
It is through Stern that we see the transformation in Schindler, as first Stern will not even take a drink with Schindler by the end Stern looks at Schindler with an almost spiritual reverence reserved for the greatest of people. the reverence held for very very special people.
We see the slow transformation of Schindler, jump started by a fateful horse ride in the Polish countryside, it is here that Schindler first see's the little girl in the red coat, a beautiful angelic child relegated to extinction by Hitler and his monsters, this is the beginning for Schindler, the push, the horror is revealed to him. the second time he see's the girl in the red coat, she is among the dead in a wheel barrel full of corpses being wheeled to a fire to be incinerated. Her life snuffed out like a candle. This is the moment when Schindler knows he must act, that all the money in the world is worthless to a man who cannot sleep at night., or escape the guilt of not acting when so much depended on people acting.
From that moment on Schindler is relentless in protecting his Jews, the Schindler Jews, he overcomes every obstacle the Nazi's place in front of him, he bargains with the very devil himself, and wins. But not till the last day of the war, and even then can he rest. The Nazi's were relentless in their thirst for Jewish blood and Schindler had to be just as relentless.
A masterpiece and a historical look at Mankind's darkest hour, which will live for a thousand years as testament , the thousand years the Nazis thought their Reich, which ended in flame, destruction and the embarrassment and blight on the character of mankind. Thankfully there were men like Schindler to show the other side of what mankind was capable of, and can aspire to be.