The First Holocaust Film
Wanda Jakubowska’s “The Last Stage”
Deutsche Fassung
Abstract
“The Last Stage”, a 1948 production by director and Auschwitz survivor Wanda Jakubowska, is the first feature film about Nazi concentration camps. Although the Red Army and the Polish leadership initially supported Jakubowska, the movie was soon side-lined for ideological and aesthetic reasons. It did not meet the requirements of Socialist Realism or Polish cinema’s romantic-patriotic tradition. But Jakubowska’s film language remains effective to this day. Her images and approaches have become classic means of visually representing the Holocaust and have influenced numerous directors right up to Steven Spielberg.
(Osteuropa 10/2012, pp. 71–84)