Holocaust as Fiction
From Andrzej Wajda to Quentin Tarantino
Deutsche Fassung
Abstract
Time and time again, representation of the Holocaust by means of art has been declared impossible, and nonetheless it is tried over and over. Andrzej Wajda’s film about the Polish physician Janusz Korczak, who ran an orphanage in the Warsaw Ghetto and went to his death with those under his protection, does not conceal the dilemmas its hero faced. But its reconciliatory ending and unwavering affirmation of education and enlightenment are misleading. A provocative, historically incorrect film such as Quentin Tarantino's “Inglorious Bastards” does greater justice to the moral complexity of its topic than conventional “Holocaust cinema”.
(Osteuropa 11-12/2014, pp. 103–114)