The Fresno Bee from Fresno, California • 58

Movies F6 Friday January 21 1994 The Fresno Bee Consultant lived real events of the film Movie drains your emotions am doing something important that I got an order Germans understand order Order is order stupid or not stupid is an order "I was waiting only that they would pull the guns But I stood at attention and move I behave as though not going to protect myself He said to me Get lost So I click again with tqy heels and I turned and I walk brisk walk to the corner of the atreeL And then when they ace me I start to run Totally accurate Great care was taken in the movie to re-create the time and place says Branko Lustig a native Yugoslavian who was one of the producers and who was himself a three-year intern in various Nazi labor camps No detail was too small to consider The stamp used to notarize German orders is a replica of the Mhuil (me now housed in the The film crew shot in Krakow in parts of the Old City that have not changed far centuries Ads in the media urged people to luring any items they sull had from the period of was a column of people that came And they brought old suitcases old clothes gloves hats boots it says Lustig Though the film com not permitted inside built a mirror-im- permitted Spielberg I has set their psyches on divergent courses Where Schindler discovers morality Goeth abandons it There's a particularly telling sequence of scenes in which Schindler attempts to plant a few seeds of kindness in mind the struggle that Goeth has with the concept is Olympian Interwoven with grand struggle are the struggles of the individual Sehin -dlerjuden to get through the day alive Some criticisms of list come from those who ay that the Jews of the film are a more or less faceless mass but I see how this argument is sustained There are several lives that are returned to again and again: Helen Hirsch (Embeth Davitz) the girl Goeth takes as his maid Poldek Pfefferberg (Jonathan Sagalle) who connects Schindler with the Jewish black market and Rabbi Levartov (Ezra Dagan) who is featured in one of the flings most terrifying scenes This film is the store of Schindler but it forget the lives that moved him to action is an extremely difficult film to get through There are no pull-aways or clever editing to save tiie viewer from the violence it is so terrible and random that it is truly frightening and infuriating You can by to make sense of it but there realty is no sense to be found draining emotionally and physically but no other way that this story could have been told and have the effect that it should Any senti-mentalization of this story would have ruined it for this reason that been declared a minor miracle that this film came from Spielberg who never met a contrived emotion he like This is unfair to the director 8 best efforts ftf works because the emotions contrived He's never been very comfortable with tiie darker aspects of his stories however and has either exaggerated them or sweetened them victory here is that he stands his ground and lets the darkness have its say is finest piece of work And not only The script by Steven Zaillum rite the The shot by Janusz in black and white gives the film a look that ranges from documentuy to satiny-smooth As Schindler Neeson does his best film work Fiennes is brilliant as Goeth is the glue that holds Kingsley is Amon of the camp yi of the camp on the other side the wall overcoats for the storm troopers were specialty says Lustig "But at the last moment Steven didn't want to accept them So we called all these German studios in Hamburg and Munich and Vienna And we find original ones 50 years old And we dressed the German soldiers who are running in the night in the ghetto And they are all real helmets and real In another serendipity the a factory craw was shooting in about 70 miles outside of Krakow where they discovered a courtyard which still housed forgotten box cars that had once transported the Jews from Auschwitz to the factory "When they cannot work anymore they send them in the same bos can again back to Bir-kenau to be he explains To Spielberg and Lustig and Page the movie proves that one man can make a difference "One year ago when we started this movie there was a big demonstration in Germany against neo-Naziism" Lustig Bays millions of Germans were walking with candles And I am thinking that in Schindler was also one man with a candle But he was onty And nobody saw the candle Survivors Poldek Pfefierberg (Jonathan Sagalle) and his wife Mila (Adi Nitzan) are among the workers saved by Schindler thqr were looking for me He aid 'Mrs Pfefferberg worry here coming not to take your apartment or anything: I got a apartment and I pay for it" Schindler was there to ask Mrs Pfefferberg a decorator to redo his apartment mother was hesitant because she was afraid to do business with the Germans But I said the gentleman I talked to him and he talk to me and we became a No alternative When Schindler opened hia enamtiwara factory in Krakow he begged Page to come work for him life employees it seemed safe from Nazi intervention But Page was a mechanic and hoped he could mafa hia way out of Poland to Yugoslavia and eventually into France That never happened wife was lie says when you try to escape when caught age worked for Goeth the vicious commandant of Plaszow camp Shortly after the fall of thousands of Jews were into a 16-square mile ghetto Krakow When Goeth was to evacuate the ghetto prisoners between labor camp and Auschwitz Page tried to escape His flight is a memorable scene in the movie aa SS begin to dose in on him He I hide When notice that a high ranking is going over there and shoot a woman and grab a and hit the head of the against the wall I knew the the dogs there woe two with them I knew I had chance that the dogs smell me out have to do something stand there and wait for would be liquidated So I I doit see them and stop suitcases and bundles rid things like this They over As officer you knew mentality of the other officers Poland haded in ordered dividing Pla-ssow officers remembers: I officer they child child dogs dogs no would If I them I pretend to remove come the "So I will report to him that I Continued from Pag FI resembles the structure of Yad Vmahem You are led one step at a time to the pit entering it onty when you understand how you got there And yet through it all there is a reason to find hope In this case it is because of Oskar Schindler (Liam Nee-son) a Nazi industrialist who eventually saved more than 1100 Jews from extermination It's the sort of story that would be insulting to the memory of those who died in the Holocaust if it weren't true With some condensing and rearranging for drama sticks close to Thomas 1982 book of the same name based on the memories of the Schindlerju-den tiie Jews that Schindler saved What is interesting about Schindler is that the man is no angel a Nazi he drinks and womanizes and he has highly questionable morals The primary reason he has come to Krakow Poland is because he plans to make his fortune there operating an enam-elware factory previously owned by Jews His residence in Krakow is apartments of Jews so recently evicted that they are seen leaving as he enters His interest in the Jews is twofold: He plans to use them as workers in his factory because he can get them cheaper than Polish workers and he plans to get them to put up money to start the factory Clearly no altruistic streak in the man What little altruism he has is initially limited to ignoring his shop manager Itzhak (Ben Kingsley) tendency to claim that musicians schoolteachers and old men are skilled factory But Schindler cannot ignore what the Nazis are doing around him even as he profits from their policies complaints are at first business-oriented: The practice of making Jews shovel snow when uuy should be in the factory for example is cutting into his profits Also summary deportations of workers bother him they are after all skilled factory workers hard to replace What seems to engage Schin-ality is the fi-Krakow ghetto a terrifying event that Schindler watches from a high hill Then Schindler begins his true protection of his charges Schindler is counterpointed by Amon Goeth (Ralph Fiennes) the Nazi officer in charge of the concentration camp that workers inhabit Schindler and Goeth are roughly of the same age and temperament but the war Theatre 3 bade in former home After spreading its wings for two productions at the Tower Theatre Theatre 3 Repertory Company will roost in its former home at 1644 Fulton St for the remainder of the season Beginning a six-weekend run this evening is Got the a comedy about an eccentric Texas famity Rounding out the 1993-94 season are "Italian American opening Biarch 11 and Together Teeth Apart" opening April 22 General admission is $10 Information: 486-3333 tsyrnmn Weight Loss Center The story of Los Angeles resident Leopold Page (formerly Poldek Pfefferberg) inspired Thomas KeneaHy to write the bode on which the movie is based By Lualne Lee Scripps Howard News Service HOLLYWOOD Steven filmic re-telling of the events in Krakow Poland during the early years of World War II in are 98 percent accurate Or so says Leopold Page And Page should know He was there The then-27-year-old Poldek Pfefferberg who changed his name to Page when he ed survived both the Ghetto and Plaszow concentration camp He knew Oskar Schindler well and was one of the 1100 Jews who was rescued by list of workers who were transported to safety to a factory in Schindler's home town where they would wait out the war see it happened and this is an actual historical says Page in his still-broken English Spielberg did an extraordinary job in a very difficult condition because we film everything during the winter and Poland the winter is a Emotions still raw Page who served as one of the consultants on the film says he has never gotten over the terror "I cry every time when I see the story because it remind me of when I lose my family: My parents my sister my brother-in-law and almost 100 members of my famity Only two Today Page imports handbags for sale at his shop on La Brea Avenue in Los Angeles It was Page who inspired author Thomas Kenealty to write the book on which the film is based And Page is (me of tiie Jews followed in the film as the increasingly repressive measures move to cany out the heinous "final By October of 1942 310000 Jews already had been deported to extermination camps Page first met Schindler in 1939 when the wealthy businessman visited home Page had been an officer in the Polish Army which was quickly overrun by the Germans All Polish officers were ordered to register with the Gestapo But Fags refused and instead went into hiding: One day he made a visit to hia home minute I got there there was a knock on the door and mother says 'Gestapo' She was hesitating: A man came in a tall handsome man I was behind the door listening see him only parity Remember this was and nobody knows what happen until later on But she was afraid because die knew LAURENCE GUITTARD EPS iRSTEIN II RUSSEL CROUSE ngen' 209-226-aaaar Is programming your VCR similar to building a Ferrari from popsicle sticks? it together Mae I Frogramming your VCR require an instruction manual for the instruction manual With VCR Plus and The Fresno Bee recording TV programs is one-step simple Just look in The daily TV listings or TV Week for your PlusCode a special number that appears next to the name of the show Program the number into your VCR Plus and relax No special wiring or installation iVs so easy! 7 PERFORMANCES ONLY! Jan 26 30 Saroyan Theatre VCR Plus Is available at selected Fresno area retail outlets For more Information call 1-800-258-4VCR or for help cad 1-800-432-1VCR VCR Plus PfusCods VCR and Cable Instant Programmer are trademarks of Gemstar Development I 25 Years in Fresno 5464 Pi AcnufromButterdi 432-3438 WteBMC Accepted Tickets available at the Convention Center box office usual outlets al Bass Ticket outlets The.