*****Possible Spoilers!!!*****
Before "Schindler's List" pulled at my heartstrings, there was "Holocaust," the story of 2 families during the rule of Hitler: The Weiss family, who are practically destroyed by the Jewish massacre, and The Dorf family, whose father, Erik Dorf (Michael Moriarty) works with Heydrich (David Warner) to exterminate the Jewish population in Europe.
The film is incredibly painful because of how the family is systematically destroyed (The grandparents take their own lives, the baby sister that is raped and eventually gassed, the artist son that is imprisoned and tortured because of paintings depicting the Nazi crimes.) and how many people fought to survive the horrors. Kudos to a young Meryl Streep as Inga, the German woman that marries a Jew and does everything in her power (including sleeping with a sleazy friend of the family that works at the concentration camp that her husband is in) to hold onto him, James Woods as Karl the artist that, despite the horrors inflicted on him, refuses to surrender, Rosemary Harris as Berta, the strong willed wife of Dr. Josef Weiss (Fritz Weaver), whose refusal to believe in the growing horror that will destroy the family, and Joseph Bottoms as Rudi, the young son that runs away from home and, along with his Helena (Tovah Feldshuh), joins the resistance and witnesses the horror of the Nazi Army.
The film,even after 25 years since I first saw it, is still chilling. It makes you understand why many people did not leave when the nightmare first occurred. Who would believe that such horrors would happen?
Before "Schindler's List" pulled at my heartstrings, there was "Holocaust," the story of 2 families during the rule of Hitler: The Weiss family, who are practically destroyed by the Jewish massacre, and The Dorf family, whose father, Erik Dorf (Michael Moriarty) works with Heydrich (David Warner) to exterminate the Jewish population in Europe.
The film is incredibly painful because of how the family is systematically destroyed (The grandparents take their own lives, the baby sister that is raped and eventually gassed, the artist son that is imprisoned and tortured because of paintings depicting the Nazi crimes.) and how many people fought to survive the horrors. Kudos to a young Meryl Streep as Inga, the German woman that marries a Jew and does everything in her power (including sleeping with a sleazy friend of the family that works at the concentration camp that her husband is in) to hold onto him, James Woods as Karl the artist that, despite the horrors inflicted on him, refuses to surrender, Rosemary Harris as Berta, the strong willed wife of Dr. Josef Weiss (Fritz Weaver), whose refusal to believe in the growing horror that will destroy the family, and Joseph Bottoms as Rudi, the young son that runs away from home and, along with his Helena (Tovah Feldshuh), joins the resistance and witnesses the horror of the Nazi Army.
The film,even after 25 years since I first saw it, is still chilling. It makes you understand why many people did not leave when the nightmare first occurred. Who would believe that such horrors would happen?