Documentaries: Survivors
As a Young Girl of Thirteen...
"...Holocaust survivor Simone Lagrange recounts in detail her life before the war, her deportation to Auschwitz-Birkenau, and her role in bringing Nazi war criminal Klaus Barbie to justice."
Dark Side
"Moshe's children have heard stories about their father all their lives. About his family being murdered during the Holocaust. About how Moshe's friends and neighbors turned his family in to the Nazis. About how he hid in the woods with the partisans and survived. Moshes's children always knew not to ask too much about what happened next."
Farewell Herr Schwarz
"...is a cinematic journey about buried family secrets, the Holocaust (from a third generation perspective) and how it is never too late to reclaim your heritage. Siblings Michla and Feiv'ke Schwarz survived the Holocaust but never reunited after the war. Michla moved to the soon-to-be-founded Jewish state in the Middle East and started a family there. Her brother Feiv'ke considered dead returned to East Germany, married a German woman and inexplicably lived amidst the concentration camp ruins where he was once a prisoner. The Israeli and German sides to the family lived unaware of each other for half a century until first time filmmaker Yael Reuveny probed exactly what happened to her family in 1945." (Kanopy)
Harbour of Hope
"This simultaneously heartbreaking and life - affirming documentary introduces us to Irene Krausz - Fainman, Ewa Kabacinska Jansson and Joe Rozenberg. In 1945, these three were among the 30.000 survivors that were rescued from German concentration camps by the Red Army and brought to the peaceful harbour town of Malmö, Sweden. There life began again. Coming to Sweden in 1945 was a defining moment in the lives of these survivors. Here they reveal their stories; from the complexities of adjusting to their new found freedom, to the mysteries and questions still haunting them today."
Landscapes of Memory: The Life of Ruth Klüger
"Ruth Klüger grew up in fascist Vienna, survived three years in Nazi concentration camps, and went on to become a college professor and a recognized authority on German literature. She also wrote Landscapes of Memory: A Holocaust Girlhood Remembered, an award-winning best seller.In this documentary, Klüger doesn’t mince words as she shares her thoughts on her childhood in anti-Jewish Vienna, her post–World War II life in America, her experiences as a mother of two American sons, and the culture of commemoration that has grown up around the Holocaust. Filmed in Vienna, California, Göttingen, and Israel."
The Last Survivors
"This is a landmark documentary about some of the last survivors of the Holocaust. As young children, they lived through the Holocaust. Now, some of the last remaining survivors recount their memories and the lingering trauma. Frontline offers a haunting look at how disturbing childhood experiences and unimaginable loss have impacted their daily lives and relationships—from survivor’s guilt, to crises of faith and second-generation trauma."
Liebe Perla
"The fascinating story of the special friendship forged between two women: Perla Ubitsch, the last remnant of a family of dwarfs that survived Dr. Mengele's cruel experiments in Auschwitz, and researcher Hannelore Witkovsky a German Protestant born after the war. Filmed in both Germany and Israel, we accompany Hannelore on her quest to find a lost film made by Dr. Mengele featuring Perla and her siblings."
March of the Living
"This is the moving story of the last generation of Holocaust survivors, who travel to Poland with thousands of teenagers from around the world to retrace the Death March from Auschwitz to Birkenau."
The Suicide of a Camp Survivor: The Case of Primo Levi
"This is the story of an assimilated Italian Jew, a chemist of no particular renown whose efforts to survive in fascist Italy were finally thwarted when he was deported to Auschwitz, where he survived through no effort of his own while tens of thousands around him were slaughtered—people possibly nobler, more valuable than he. He emerged from the experience a superb writer and a scarred man, who in his works sought to remember, bear witness to, and above all understand the human qualities that emerge on the sharp edge of despair. He survived the camp, burning with the need to tell how it was; and when he had done so and said it all, he gave in to depression and ended his life."
Surviving the Holocaust
"Join Ann Curry as Holocaust survivors search for those who gave them hope in the darkest days. One wants to find the friend he left behind when he didn’t move to Israel; the other hopes to reunite with the girl who was his first friend."
Surviving The Holocaust - Freddie Knoller's War
"As a young Jewish man, Freddie Knoller lived through World War II by unusual means and in extraordinary circumstances. After escaping Vienna as a teenage Jewish refugee he spent most of WWII living in the heart of occupied Paris with Nazi officers and Montmartre prostitutes, until the conflict eventually caught up with him. Fighting as part of the French Resistance, Knoller was betrayed and faced the horror of the concentration camps. Finally freed in April 1945, he weighed little more than 85 pounds. Telling his own story, in his own words, Knoller draws on intense memories that have defined him as a man to reveal the incredible adventure of his early life."
To Auschwitz and Back
"Holocaust survivor Joe Engel vividly tells the story of his journey to hell and back, including escaping from a death train and working covertly as a freedom fighter."
The Tree Grows on the Wall
"Buenos Aires. Born in Lodz, Poland, he was imprisoned for four years in one of Lodz’s ghettos. Later, he was sent to Dachau and to Auschwitz. At the end of the war, at the age of 21, he managed to escape despite the extermination of his entire family. After four decades and revisiting Lodz, Poland, he began telling his touching story. The movie is a testimony of his experience along with different cinematographic resources which will connect aesthetics of pictorial animation, family archives and interviews."
We Were So Loved
"Between 1933 and 1941, thousands of Jews fled Nazi Germany and Austria for America. Leaving behind brothers, sisters and parents, more than 20,000 of them came together in Washington Heights in New York City. Here, for the first time, they lived among Jews. While horrific reports trickled in from the camps, the emigrants cooperated to build their new society.. We Were So Beloved uses gripping personal testimony to examine the complex emotional and philosophical implications of the survival of the Jews of Washington Heights."
We'll Meet Again
"Join Ann Curry as Holocaust survivors search for those who gave them hope in the darkest days. One wants to find the friend he left behind when he didn’t move to Israel; the other hopes an old photo will reunite him with the girl who was his first friend...."
When People Die They Sing Songs
"...is the remarkable story of a mother and daughter who resolve to uncover their painful family history, buried half a century ago. This heartwarming, tender documentary opens as 93-year-old Holocaust survivor Regina has suffered a stroke, and is showing early signs of dementia. With her daughter, Sonia, by her side at every session, Regina begins work with a music therapist, who helps her sing songs in Yiddish and French, languages she spoke as a child. The act of singing the songs of her youth, emboldens Regina to impart the tragic, sorrowful stories of her wartime past to her daughter before her memory vanishes completely. The shared music therapy experience helps revitalize this mother-daughter relationship, and emboldens them to recapture their family history, unspoken for decades, before it is lost forever."
(Landscapes of Memory: The Life of Ruth Klüger)