Schindler’s List Movie Review

          A riveting film based on a true story that takes place in Poland during WWII, “Schindler’s List” is the story of businessman Oscar Schindler who decides to take advantage of the Jewish persecution by acquiring cheap Jewish labour to work in his factory. The Jewish accountant the he hires, Sten, starts secretly hiring people who would otherwise be sent to death camps. Schindler finds out and helps him, using his immense wealth to bribe officials and together they end up saving 1,100 lives that would have otherwise been killed.

          This movie takes place in a time where Schindler, being a rich, white, Christian, male member of the Nazi Party has all the privileges, and his Jewish factory workers have none. The Jewish people have been stripped of all their wealth and possessions are forced to live in cramped, dirty ghettos with very poor living conditions and no protection against the cruel punishments and random acts of violence committed by the Nazi Commandant in charge of the camp and his guards. They have to rely on Schindler to have anything, such as a reprieve from the camp to work in his factory in order to have basic supplies to be able to stay alive. Many of the Jewish business men who originally backed Schindler didn’t want to but they had very little choice: they couldn’t keep their money anyway and this way they might have a little something to barter with when they went to the ghettos.

          The camps tore apart all aspects of the Jewish people’s lives: they separated families, including children from their parents, they denied them the very basic rights of enough food and decent shelter, they did not allow them to practice any of their beliefs; they took their lives and they took away any hope that things would ever improve. Helen, the maid to the Nazi Commandant in charge of the camp, stated that she knew how the rest of her life would go: the Commandant would continue to beat her until one day he killed her. This took away any hope, positivity or self-respect or anything that would make her feel like a human being.

          Schindler did attempt and succeed at giving his Jewish workers some of their rights back when he bribed the Commandant to allow the people on his list to work for him at a new factory instead of being sent to the death camps, (most would’ve gone to Auschwtiz). These rights included a healthy working environment without fear of violence from the guards, the right to practice their religion and customs (including not working on their Sabbath Day) and the right to have hope that their future would be better their current state and that their children would not have to endure the horrors that they suffered. Providing these things was a huge risk for Schindler and it ate up his entire fortune. At the end he was forced to run away because the Allies might persecute him for being a part of the Nazi Party.

          If I was in that position I like to think that I would’ve done the same as Schindler did but it took an enormous amount of courage that I’m not sure if I possess. This movie made me appalled at the horrors humanity bequeaths upon itself but it also made me proud that we such heroes in our history, like Schindler who were able to make a difference.