The Holocaust Industry

Has any one else noticed that there exists a virtual cottage industry of Holocaust books and movies that pop up at this time of year?  The movies are here no doubt in time for Academy Award consideration, because, well frankly, there is nothing like a little genocide to inspire award giving. This proliferation of Holocaust "entertainment" seems to be replacing what was once a cottage industry of Hitler biographies.  In the 1990's we saw a virtual market glut of Hitler biographies that followed in the heels of Third Reich books in the 1980's.  Of course let's not forget that iconic representation of concentration camp suffering, Hogan's Heroes.  Death camp as sitcom.  Who knew?

I find this latest round of Holocaust movies extremely troubling.  In fact I find almost all Holocaust movies problematic, even that one movie that for many represents the pinnacle of dramatic representation of the Holocaust; Schindler's List.    Claude Lanzmann once said that the evil of the Holocaust cannot be explained thus it cannot be represented on film, as entertainment.  Besides, when exactly did the suffering of others become entertainment?  Oh, wait...yeah I forgot...kiddie porn, genocide movies, slasher porn, etc etc ad infinitum. 

Lanzmann, who created the iconic and brilliant nine and a half hour film Shoah (1985) utilized not one millimeter of death camp archival footage. Lanzmann once stated that evil cannot be represented or understood.  I would add to that, should the suffering of others be represented in a narrative form that is meant to amuse? To entertain?  The latest spate of Holocaust entertainment are extremely troubling in that they provide to the viewing audience a narrative of redemption that is not only not historically accurate but which misleads the viewing public into a false understanding not only of Jewish suffering but German guilt.

Currently  playing at your local cineplex are The Reader, starring Kate Winslet and Defiance starring Daniel Craig.  Two beautiful contemporary stars who play Nazi's in their respective movie.  While I have not seen either movie, I am familiar with the novel, The Reader and the television commercial of Defiance is  enough to send me back to watching all nine and a half hours of Shoa (to the despair of my children) for relief from this current narrative of redemption.  The image of the Nazi commandant on his white horse riding through the forest saving people....is this image, this single of Nazi resistance a true representation of the genocidal suffering of Jews, Poles, Gypsies and others?  And let us not forget German culpability.  Superficial narratives such as these that turn genocide into entertainment and meant to be consumed with popcorn are not innocent.  They are not, as some might say harmless.  As we all know, over time the representation of these acts of Nazi or German redemption become in themselves a form of truth.  The truth and the enormity of the machinery of genocide eventually becomes lost over time if these superficial narratives become consumed into popular culture.  As a teacher I often heard students refer to Schindler's List as their sole and only source of information on the Holocaust.  Movie watched. Information received.  No more thinking required.

For an interesting taxonomy of Holocaust movies check out Slate at 

http://www.slate.com/id/2207553/pagenum/all/#p2