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| The Last Fighters |
History comes alive in this moving documentary in which six of the remaining survivors of the 1943 Warsaw Ghetto Uprising step in front of the camera to recall those momentous events.
The survivors include Kazik Rotem, Masha Gleitman, Pnina Greenspan and Aharon Carmi; Brunk Spigel from Canada; and the celebrated Marek Edelman, who chose to remain in Poland. Now in their eighties, most live in Israel (anonymously, as it happens, among neighbours who know nothing of their heroic past), where they continue to meet every 18th of April, as they have for the past 60 years.
Then youngsters, they belonged to various Zionist and anti-Zionist groups, including the Bund. Their searing memories of the historic events - in which hundreds of ill-equipped Jewish fighters were able to hold off the Nazi war machine for a month - are far richer and more complex than depicted in history and official commemorations. The whole dramatic event, rich in detail, is brought to life through the lucid voices of these resilient survivors.
Followed by:
The True Story of Marianne Golz
Monica Repetto, 52 mins, Italy, 2007. Italian/English/German with English subtitles. A touching documentary about Marianne Golz-Goldlust, a little-known Viennese operetta singer who was executed by the Nazis in 1943 for helping Jews and others escape from Prague.
