Searching for Schindler (21 page)

A Titsch picture of German and Ukranian soldiers marching through Plaszów concentration camp.

The camp was rather chillingly re-created for the film
Schindler’s List
on the site of the nearby quarry, where, during the Holocaust, Jewish prisoners from Plaszów were put to work.

The all-too-real Plaszów camp commandant, Amon Goeth, on the balcony of his residence overlooking the camp. From here he would fire random shots at prisoners with his sniper rifle.

Amon Goeth, a nightmare figure to prisoners, fully uniformed and mounted.

Majola, Goeth’s mistress, on the balcony of his residence at Plaszów.

Historic photos like those on the facing page allowed Spielberg and actor Ralph Fiennes to re-create with some authenticity the brutal character of Goeth. Spielberg spoke to Tom of how Fiennes, in his uniform as Goeth, was embarrassed when one of the Jewish women survivors visiting the set had backed away from him on trembling legs.

The film reenactment of the scene in which Goeth’s house-and-stable boy, Lisiek, is shot dead by his master’s sniper rifle for supposedly mishandling a saddle.

Ralph Fiennes as Amon Goeth.

Goeth’s residence as re-created for the film
Schindler’s List.

A still from the film of Jews at a checkpoint during an
Aktion
in the ghetto in Kraków. Those with work permits were allowed to work at Oskar’s and other factories, while many others—children, the aged and those without labor documents—were gassed in carbon monoxide chambers at the Belzec camp.

The scene in the film in which the Schindler women are mistakenly taken to Auschwitz. They are later rescued as a result of Schindler’s intervention and taken to Brinnlitz to work at his factory.

From the film, the women arriving at Schindler’s factory after their Auschwitz ordeal.

The famous speech made by Schindler (Liam Neeson) in front of his Jewish factory workers and the SS garrison on the eve of Allied liberation, appealing to the German soldiers to ignore orders to exterminate all prisoners.