Homework: read what is below. Write a short answer to:
1) ONE of the Discussion Questions,
2) ONE of the Character Development questions, and
3) ONE reaction paper based on #16.

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Description: This film depicts the heroic actions of Oskar Schindler, a German war profiteer who, because of his fundamental humanity and great courage, saved more than 1,100 Jews from death in the Holocaust. The film is based on an exceptional "novel," Schindler's List by Thomas Keneally. The word "novel" has been applied to this book only because the dialogue and certain details are fictional. Mr. Keneally based the book closely on events reported to him by the "Schindlerjuden," people whose lives had been saved by Schindler and who were eyewitnesses to Schindler's heroic actions.

* Oskar Schindler (1908 -1974) was an ethnic German born in the village of Zwittau in Sudetenland, a portion of Czechoslovakia with many German inhabitants. He was known in the village by the name "Gauner," which meant swindler or sharper. A Jewish woman who lived in the town and whose life Schindler later saved, said, "As a Zwittau citizen I never would have considered him capable of all these wonderful deeds."

Oskar Schindler was a member of the Nazi party. He arrived in Cracow, Poland, just after the collapse of the Polish Army and at the beginning of the German occupation. His first effort, as shown in the film, was to capitalize on the misfortune of the Jews who had recently been forbidden from engaging in business. As an added inducement for them to "invest" in his new business, he offered to employ the investors or their relatives in his factory. For years, relations between Schindler and his Jewish workers were circumspect. But as the lot of the Jews in Poland worsened, the workers at Schindler's factory noticed that they were somehow protected. Word of this spread through the Jewish community.

Schindler spent his evenings entertaining the SS and German Army officers. His apparent political reliability and his engaging personality made him popular among the Nazi elite. During the day Schindler would entertain officials and visitors to the factory, pouring them vodka and Schnapps, telling them that he knew how to get work out of the Jews and that he wanted more brought into his factory. In this way he managed to bring into the plant and save from the gas chamber intellectuals, artists, and the families and relatives of his workers.

Schindler's acts of kindness and bravado saved lives on a daily basis. It was very dangerous to intercede for Jews in Nazi Germany, but Schindler did repeatedly. Often he would say "Stop killing my good workers. We've got a war to win." One woman, Rena Finder, who was forced into slave labor at the age of ten, recalled that she was about to be shot by an SS guard for breaking a machine used to make bullet casings. Schindler saved her life, telling the guard: "You idiot, this little girl could not break that machine."

In 1943 the Cracow ghetto was ordered closed and many of the Jews were sent to the death camps. Those people able to work were moved to the forced labor camp at Plaszow, just outside the city. The conditions in Plaszow were terrible. Many workers died and there were frequent transfers to nearby Auschwitz. In the Spring of 1943 Schindler moved into an active phase of his antifascist efforts, conspiring directly with his accountant/manager Itzhak Stern and other employees to save Jews from extermination and to outwit Nazi officials. He bribed Amon Goeth, the commander of Plaszow, to allow him to set up a sub-camp for his workers at the factory, "to save time getting to the job." It was then easier to smuggle food and medicine into the factory. When Plaszow was slated to be shut down and its prisoners transferred to the death camps. Schindler, during a night of drinking, convinced the chief of the war equipment command for all of Poland that Plaszow's workshops were well suited for serious war production. This idea survived the General's hangover. Plaszow was converted to a war-essential concentration camp and the inmates were no longer slated to be transferred to Auschwitz for extermination.

But still, Stern had doubts about Schindler. These ended in late 1943. In August Schindler hosted visitors sent to him by the underground organization that the Joint Distribution Committee (an American Jewish welfare organization) operated in occupied Europe. Schindler told Stern to speak frankly and the men asked for a full report on anti-Semitic persecutions in Plaszow. Stern thought this was a foolish risk and resisted, but finally Schindler ordered him to write the report. Stern wrote everything he could remember, mentioning the names of the living and the dead. When the underground brought him answering letters from America and Palestine, any doubts that Stern had about the integrity and judgment of Schindler were answered.

Schindler, aided by his wife, Emilie, provided extra food and brought in medicine, all purchased on the black market. They allowed religious celebrations in the factory. The SS guards were given regular bribes to keep them from reporting what was happening. 
When the tide turned on the Eastern Front and the German forces were in full retreat, Schindler convinced the authorities to permit him to move the factory and the camp to his home area of Sudetenland. 

After the war, Schindler's talents of bonhomie and lobbying government officials were not as helpful in business as they had been during the war. His business ventures were not successful. The Schindlerjuden gave him money to buy a farm in Argentina but it failed in 1957. Schindler and his wife then separated and he returned to Europe, living part of the year in both Germany and part of the year in Israel. The Schindlerjuden and the State of Israel then supported Schindler. In the later years of his life, Schindler was honored as a "Righteous Gentile" by the Israelis and was the subject of veneration in that country. 

Schindler had married his wife, Emilie in 1928. He was tall, handsome and had an eye for women. He was not faithful in his marriage. The film omits the role that Emilie Schindler played in Schindler's conversion to antifascism and in helping to care for the Schindlerjuden. Emilie fully supported what her husband did for his workers. She cooked and cared for the sick. She earned praise and a reputation of her own. She has written a book about her life with Schindler, entitled, Where Light and Shadow Meet. We have not read it.

* Itzhak Stern was the head accountant for a large Jewish owned export-import firm located in Cracow, a large Polish city near the Czech border. After the occupation of Poland, the Germans "Aryanized" businesses by seizing ownership, installing a German Trustee, making the former owner into an employee hired to manage the business, and replacing many Jewish workers with "Aryan" workers. The German Trustee of the business in which Stern worked, however, acted strangely. He left the discharged workers on the social insurance registry which enabled them to maintain their workers' identity cards. This protected them, for a while, from deportation. He also, secretly, gave the former workers money to buy food. After the end of the war Stern learned that the "German" Trustee was actually a Jew who was masquerading as an "Aryan." It was this man who first introduced Stern to Schindler saying "You know, Stern, you can have confidence in my friend Schindler." However, it took years for Stern to fully trust Schindler. It was difficult to sort through Schindler's greed, high living, close association with Nazi officials, and membership in the Nazi party, to see the real man. These were the very traits that permitted Schindler to survive detection by the Nazis.

Words and phrases: Sudeten German; Schindlerjuden; ghetto; forced labor camp; concentration camp; SS; Final Solution; Sabbath; Auschwitz, genocide, crimes against humanity.

Discussion Questions:
1. There have been many atrocities committed throughout history. The Holocaust was not the first or the last. Why is the Holocaust recalled with such horror?
2. Has the Holocaust changed the actions of political leaders in the time since it occurred? How does this relate to the actions of NATO and the United Nations in Bosnia-Herzegovina and Kosovo? Iraq?
3. Why didn't the Allied Powers, who knew that mass killings were taking place, focus their firepower on the ovens and the killing operations? The answer has something to do with one of the major reasons that President Truman decided to drop atom bombs on Japan, an action which lead to the deaths of many civilians. See Learning Guide to Fat Man and Little Boy.
4. In this film almost none of the Jewish characters that we get to know well are killed. Why is that? Given the power of this film, what would have been the effect on the audience, particularly those whose relatives were murdered in the Holocaust, had this occurred? How does your answer to this question relate to the decision to use black and white rather than color film?
5. Why is this film shot mostly in black and white? What were the advantages to filming these events in black and white? Color is used four times in the film. Why are certain scenes shot in color?
 
Character Development
6. Quick Discussion Question: At the beginning of the war Schindler was a greedy high living war profiteer anxious to profit from the misfortune of the Jews. By the end of the war, what was his attitude toward money? What made him change?
7. There was a theme that ran through most of Schindler's actions: his delight in women; his interest in good times and high living; his friendliness with everyone (including the Nazis); and his protection of the Jews who came to work in his factory. Can you describe what this was?
8. Can you describe the personal relationship that developed between Itzhak Stern and Schindler?
9. What was Schindler doing when he talked to Amon Goeth about power and told him that refraining from imposing punishment showed greater power than imposing it? Did Schindler's tactic work? Why not? What was the film trying to tell us through this series of incidents?
10. How does the concept of "alien" or "other" work in the psychology of the perpetrators of the Holocaust and other atrocities and mass killings? Tell us how this concept works in the following published report from the attempted genocide of Tutsis in Rwanda. A Hutu village headman had married a Tutsi woman and they had three sons. When the killings of Tutsis began, an official from the central government came to the village headman and told him that unless he participated in the genocide he would be killed. The headman then sent his sons out of the house and killed their mother. Then, in front of the Hutus of the village, he personally murdered each of his sons.
11. How does the idea that the victim is somehow regarded as "evil" affect all atrocities and mass killings?
12. Define the concept of the "good German." Identify the "good Germans" in the film. Explain the psychology of compartmentalization.
13. Schindler's wife, Emilie, who was very much his partner in his heroic efforts, said, "We only did what we had to do." How do you reconcile this statement with the actions of most of the German people who lived during the Second World War and who permitted the Holocaust to occur without protest. See Learning Guide to Judgment at Nuremberg.
14. Schindler was a gambler and an opportunist who liked living on the edge and outsmarting the SS. Does the fact that he may have had an emotional predilection for connivance and for cheating the authorities take away any of the glory of his accomplishments? A similar comment can be made about Emilie Schindler, that she was to a certain extent simply following the lead of her husband and being a good wife. Does this take away any of the glory of her accomplishments?
15. Is there a mystery to profound human goodness or evil, or can everything be explained by human psychology? 

Ethical Emphasis
16. Elie Wiesel, a student of the Holocaust, has said that "indifference" is the greatest sin and punishment of the Holocaust. Explain what he meant by this and comment on whether or not you believe he is right?