Dark lullabies

They are the children of survivors and of perpetrators of the Holocaust. Polarised as their heritage is, many of this generation share a legacy of silence. Canadian filmmaker Irene Angelico, herself a child of concentration camp survivors, undertakes a deeply personal journey; she asks what happened and why? This powerful documentary is structured around the filmmaker’s quest. Having grown up in the shadow of the Holocaust, she searches for comprehension through interviews with survivors and their children in Montreal and in Israel. Despite her own reluctance, her journey inevitably takes her to Germany. Rare interviews show a range of voices among her German contemporaries. Some are as compelled as she to pierce the silence, while others retreat into prejudice and denial. The film offers no easy answers. (Awards: Mannheim, New York, Tokyo)