It's 1943, Germany is a fascist country, World War II is raging, and businessman Oskar Schindler makes good profit of the situation. As the prosecution of Jews reaches his workforce, he begins to realize the humanitarian catastrophe that is going on, and his motivation turns from money to salvation.
Steven Spielberg is Jewish, and one of the best movie directors of our time. With "Schindler's List", he knows what he's talking about, and he has the skills and the means to create a movie that meets the highest standards in every regard. As a result, "Schindler's List" is a technically perfect production, and a deeply moving experience.
In it, we witness some of the numbingly atrocious practices carried out by Nazi officials and sympathisers, and the transformation of a pure businessman into an empathic, unselfish saviour. The depiction of the Nazi regime is scarily realistic, on all levels, with Ralph Fiennes giving a chilling portrayal of SS Commander Amon Göth. It goes hand in hand with the oppositional personal transformation of Oskar Schindler, played by Liam Neeson. The characterization of Schindler, a man between the lines, is handled with great care and precision. The acting in this movie is flawless, down to the last extra that has only seconds of screen time.
Writing, lighting, set pieces, filming, editing - there's not a single frame in "Schindler's List" that feels wrong or weak. It's a visual feast in black and white, mimicking the style of 1940s cinema, but all elements of the film - successfully - serve one purpose: Tell the story. And it is a profound story that is full of horror, but also full of compassion and hope.
"Schindler's List" is a brilliant, outstanding movie. It has a bit of a flaw, though, the same way "Saving Private Ryan" (1998) has: It can't compete with reality. When millions are dying, there is no cherry picking. A historical background such as this will always be overwhelming, and putting an individual story of heroism at its center has potential to create distortion. In reality, for the vast majority of victims, there was no one there to step in and help. The situation in the movie is very bleak, but in reality, for 99.9% of those affected, it was even bleaker. If a director chooses to direct a movie about a serious, decisive historical event, his work will be, and has to be, judged in comparison to actual historic fact. Artistic freedom, even if used with great virtuosity, can be inherently inadequate.
Given the sensitive subject matter, that is inherently problematic to approach, "Schindler's List" is still, or maybe precisely therefore, an astonishing achievement. While the movie does focus on individuals, it also manages to tie all the threads together, completing a big picture that is, in an cinematic sense, actually adequate to reality. We must not forget that it's still a dramatization, and there is a little bit of fiction in "Schindler's List" - but the end result is still so accurate, and so coherent, that there's just no point in arguing.
"Schindler's List" is a massive success, both in terms of art and education.
Verdict: Utterly gut-wrenching, utterly beautiful. 9.5/10
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0108052/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schindler%27s_List
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