Schindler's List is a movie that though I had heard much about, I had never seen. I don't know if it was out of lack of interest for the subject, fear of the reportedly graphic scenes, or just the knowledge of its length that I avoided the film, but I did. I can remember when I was in 8th grade hearing an announcement over the loudspeaker that all of the seniors had to bring in their permission slips so that they would be allowed to watch the film in the auditorium the following week. That certainly piqued my interest. What was it about this film that was so bad that it required a permission slip, yet so good that it was being shown in school for the students? When I learned that we would be watching the film in class, I was excited and curious to finally see what all the hype was about. What I found out was that it was a very sad, very depressing, and very beautiful film. Not beautiful in the sense of those Jane Austen pictures with the rolling English landscapes and multi-colored dresses, but beautiful in its complexity and honesty. It was brutally graphic, but not in a gratuitous way like the popular films of today, it was graphic because it was an accurate portrayal of true event in history. Without the violence and nudity it would have betrayed the truth, sugarcoating it, and providing a dishonest picture of the evil that was the Holocaust. The film begins in Krakow, Poland just after the collapse of the Polish army and at the beginning of the German occupation. Oskar Schindler, a tall handsome womanizer arrives in the city looking to open a factory in order to profit from the war. Since the Jews are no longer permitted to own businesses, Oskar obtains a factory from a Jewish man named Itzhak Stern, and appoints him as his accountant and manager. The two form a strange relationship, Oskar taking advantage of Stern's talent, and Stern distrustingly but obediently following Schindler's orders.
