Two important DVDs

CYNTHIA RAMSAY

Two documentaries of particular relevance and interest to the Jewish community have been released recently on DVD: A Film Unfinished and Hijacking the Holy Land: Palestine, Propaganda and Peace, both of which will also air on TV next month.

A Film Unfinished is director Yael Hersonski’s first feature documentary film, but she brings to it years of experience editing programs for Israeli television, as well as producers Noemi Schory and Itay Ken-Tor of Belfilms. Schory founded Belfims in 1988 and serves as a film director and producer for Yad Vashem; Ken-Tor has been with Belfilms as a director and producer of documentary series since 2000. Together, the trio has put together a film that should become part of any Holocaust education endeavor.

The narration provides the necessary context for viewers: among thousands of films found after the Second World War in a concrete vault was one called Das Ghetto (The Ghetto). Featuring a mix of what turned out to be staged and unstaged scenes shot in the Warsaw Ghetto in 1942, the film, which bore no credits and no narration of its own, was considered a documentation of ghetto life and death until the discovery almost 40 years later of footage that included outtakes, clearly showing that healthier-looking Jews were forced to be actors in various scenes.

A Film Unfinished presents all the footage of the propaganda film (just over an hour), explaining which sequences were set up by the Nazis, such as an elaborate funeral procession and a champagne party, showing the supposed richness of Jews in the ghetto, and shots of these supposedly wealthy Jews passing indifferently by the outstretched arms of their begging brethren. It also explains which shots were of the real conditions in the ghetto; these include footage of emaciated individuals and people having to step over corpses in the streets.

As in other ghettos, the Warsaw Ghetto had a Nazi-appointed Jewish council, and part of the narration is from the diary of the head of that council, Adam Czerniaków, who clandestinely kept records in the hope that they would be read by future generations, as well as from material from the archives organized by Emanuel Ringelblum for the same reason. Several survivors of the ghetto supplement the documentary with their memories, as well as their commentary on the scenes being shown of the Nazi propaganda film. Information for the documentary is also gleaned from reports written by the head of the Jewish Quarter in Warsaw, Heinz Auerswald, to his superiors, and a re-enactment of testimony given by Willy Wist, the only cameraman who could be identified as having worked on the project. Wist claims he knew nothing of the Nazis’ intentions with regard to the Jews in the ghetto.

More information about A Film Unfinished can be found at afilmunfinished.com, where visitors can also download a free copy of a 12-page study guide prepared by educator and filmmaker Stuart Weinstock of Columbia University. It will air on VisionTV on May 2, 7 p.m.

Not as well crafted or as vital to watch for Jewish community members, Hijacking the Holy Land is nonetheless an important documentary to show to people who are undecided or under-educated about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Director Chris Atkins has 18 years of experience in television, while executive producer Joe Amaral is the author of Understanding Jesus and the host and producer of the TV show First Century, which tries to teach Christians about the biblical roots of Christianity. Their pro-Israel stance is clear in Hijacking the Holy Land, but that doesn’t mean that the evidence they provide is any less true.

The documentary is divided into many sections, framed within the context of the main question of whether peace can ever be gained by Israel ceding land to the Palestinians. The filmmakers offer much evidence that Palestinian children are taught from a young age not only to hate Jews, but to aspire to martyrdom by killing Jews, and that Arab and Palestinian leaders will not be satisfied until Israel (and Jews) no longer exist. The documentary provides ample film footage and television clips over decades that show Arab and Palestinian protests against Jews, and the extreme anti-Israeli propaganda being spread by Palestinian media, academics and clerics, as well as claims that deny any Jewish history in the area at all. It examines the central role of former Palestine Liberation Organization head Yasser Arafat in escalating the terror against Israel.

Hijacking the Holy Land also goes through the history of the region and tackles head on the criticisms against Israel, such as it being an apartheid state and an occupier. It does so through interviews with many experts on, or living in, the region, including professors from York University and representatives of Palestinian Media Watch, Arabs for Israel and others, as well as Amir Gissin, consul general of Israel for Toronto and Western Canada, and Israel Defence Forces spokesman Capt. Benjamin Rutland.

Hijacking the Holy Land will air on PBS’s Independent Lens series on May 3. Check local listings for times.

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