Shoah

Nov 1 1985 Not Rated 9h 26m

Documentary, History, War

Director Claude Lanzmann spent 11 years on this sprawling documentary about the Holocaust, conducting his own interviews and refusing to use a single frame of archival footage. Dividing Holocaust witnesses into three categories – survivors, bystanders, and perpetrators – Lanzmann presents testimonies from survivors of the Chelmno concentration camp, an Auschwitz escapee, and witnesses of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, as well as a chilling report of gas chambers from an SS officer at Treblinka.

Official Trailer

Plot

Claude Lanzmann directed this 9 1/2 hour documentary of the Holocaust without using a single frame of archive footage. He interviews survivors, witnesses, and ex-Nazis (whom he had to film secretly since they only agreed to be interviewed by audio). His style of interviewing by asking for the most minute details is effective at adding up these details to give a horrifying portrait of the events of Nazi genocide. He also shows, or rather lets some of his subjects themselves show, that the anti-Semitism that caused 6 million Jews to die in the Holocaust is still alive and well in many people who still live in Germany, Poland, and elsewhere.

Written by

Claude Lanzmann

Directed by

Claude Lanzmann

Cast

Simon Srebnik, Michael Podchlebnik, Motke Zaïdl

Crew

View crew

Production Countries

France

Production Companies

BBC, Historia, Les Films Aleph, Ministère de la culture

Languages

, Français, English, Polski, Deutsch

Awards

Won 2 BAFTA 15 wins total

Trailers

SHOAH Masters of Cinema Trailer

Official Trailer

Featurettes

Claude Lanzmann on Shoah

Scores

# of Votes

11,022

Average Rating

8.7 out of 10

Metascore

Popularity

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