Schindler's List

Oskar Schindler & his workers at his original factory in Krakow

The movie Schindler's List first follows the eviction of Polish Jews to a ghetto in Krakow. Here is where a struggling business man and a prominent member of the Nazi party named Oskar Schinlder. Not knowing much about running or working for a business, Schindler hires a man who works at the Jewish Counsel to do this for him. Since Jewish people cannot be paid directly, Schindler strikes up a deal with each of the Jews that he hires to pay them in pots and pans, which is what his business produces. Then, a concentration camp is built in Krakow. Schindler has to make a deal with the Nazi official who runs the camp to let his workers continue to come to the factory and work. This continues for some time until all the Jews at the camp are to be sent to Auschwitz. Schindler again uses his connections and his wealth and buys the Jews at the camp. After doing so, the Jews are put into separate trains based on their gender. By accident, the women are sent to Auschwitz while the men are sent to the correct destination. Schindler then has to go to Auschwitz and again pay to have his workers released. As the women are boarding the train Nazi officers come and grab all of the little girls. Schindler then has to argue that they are essential workers and he needs them for a specific job. He then has all his workers back at his factory where they are now making artillery shells. However, none of the shells that they make work and it is rumored that this has been Schindler's doing. At the factory over the next few years, no one is killed and the Jews are allowed to observe the Sabbath every Friday. One day, however, Schindler learns that he has run out of money, but it is just in time considering the fact that the war has been ended. The guards at Schindler's factory (who he has been bribing for the past years in order not to kill the Jews) are ordered to kill all the Jews in their camps, but do not. Schindler flees just after midnight with a gift from all his workers. In this scene, Schindler reevaluates all that he has done to save people and how he knows that he could have done more. Schindler saved more then 1,100 Jews.

To me, power is being in control of something. For example, the most powerful people in our world today are leaders of countries or large companies. To Goethe, power was being able to control everything around him and he did abuse the power that he had. He felt the need to be the most powerful person around him. Schindler felt that power was being able to control things, but not doing so.  I think that at first, Schindler did abuse the power that he had, he wanted to make money and that is all, but as time went on things changed. Schindler used his power to help others and in turn save lives. 

There were many events that took place to turn Schindler from an "anti-hero" to a hero. I think that one event that really had a shocking impression on Schindler was when he saw the evacuation of the Krakow ghettos. He seemed to be very disturbed by how the Nazis were treating the Jews. Another event that took place was when he saw all the dead Jews at the concentration camp and remembered the little girl in the red coat being burned. These, along with becoming better friends with his workers turned Schindler around and realize that all this death and destruction wasn't a good thing and shouldn't be happening.

I do think this film was effective. Although it was very graphic, I think that is one thing that made it so. It showed the horrors that the Jews had to live through (and often times, die from). It also showed what a hero Schindler was, but it didn't paint him as some perfect human that never did anything wrong. It showed each character as they actually were and showed what really happened with the Schindler Jews.