The first time I've seen it, Schindler's list didn't give me much of an impression. It was horrific, black and white, and I was 15. Now, after I got myself quite a cinematographic culture, feeling the urge to identify Spieblerg's masterpiece, I came back to this movie. I knew it was rated as one of the best films generally, ever, but when I took a look at the reviews, I became really worried. Most of the 1/10 ratings bring reasonless motivations for this film's criticism.
The main points of criticism that I saw are the following: 1) it manipulates facts; 2) presents a too distinct line between good jews and evil Nazis; 3) too emotional; 4) money grab; 5) "Holocaust is bad, we already knew it" (and this is an almost exact quote);
1) the claims for this point of criticism are that it portrays a positive figure of Oskar Schindler, exaggerates several aspects of the holocaust, and portrays essentially bad Nazis (we to this latter point in 2)); Let's get this straight: unlike some reviewers claim, Oskar Schindler didn't end up as an enriched Industrialist, as some reviewers wrongly claim. In other words, he didn't earn off the holocaust anything. On the contrary, he spent his entire fortune on bribes and corruption acts in order to aid his Jewish workers. He even had to escape to Argentina, as many Nazi officers did after WWII. As for the claims of overly dramatisation, that is certainly an aspect of the film. There are a few scenes which are not accurate (e.g. the shower scene - in real life, jews didn't fear the gas chamber as they where purposely misinformed). Generally, though, I didn't see that much of an overly dramatization. Most of the times, the film presented simply factual events. Jews were in fact killed and persecuted, there's nothing overly dramatized. Concentration camps where truly such bloody places as seen in the film. Instead, maybe it even downgraded violence quite a lot., still being incredibly bloody as a film.
2) Good jews vs. bad Nazis; I remember Hans Landa's monologue from the beginning of Inglorious Basterds, which centered on jews being rats in the sense that they're generally a population that could figure out a solution easily. Do not get me wrong here (obviously Landa stereotypes this immensely), but this is portrayed often, mainly in the first portion of the film. Jews going to the Synagogue to buy and sell instead of praying, some jews that join the police force and essentially collaborate with the Nazis, and some jews fight each other when hiding away during the ghetto persecution scene. I clearly would not say that all jews are good nor that all German soldiers are bad, but that shouldn't be a matter to be portrayed in a holocaust film. To see an avid jew, go watch "A Christmas Carol". As for "bad Nazis", I'd like to clear out again what is Nazional-Socialism. It was an extremist, right-wing movement that enhanced, in this case, Germany's national identity and superiority on the base of racial distinction, and urged violence on anyone that would not be member of the "superior" race. This movement, along with fascism, attracted a great deal of fanatics. I'd like to suggest the view of "Novecento", which similarly depicts the rise of fascism in Italy and its ruthless cruelty, carried on by it he insane and violent individuals which joined the party in the early twenties. I know that one movie depicted a Nazi soldier's moral division during WWII, called "Onore e Lealtà", which has low reviews for the same reason that prevents this film from portraying "good" Nazis: it is kind of dangerous, and can easily turn in a glorification of Nazis. Nonetheless, most of the cruelty is carried through a notorious war criminal, Amon Goeth.
3) Spielberg is of Jewish origins. As a filmmaker, he's considered this story very personal. Moreover, he is notorious for being emotional in his serious films.
4) It is well known that Spielberg chose to renounce for his fee as he considered it "blood money". Of course studios have to do a profit of their movies, but film is still a form of art. Movie makers of Spielberg's caliber do films without a simple capitalistic view of making money, but with the purpose of making an art work. Schindler's list is not a fancy action blockbuster, if nothing else, its black and white colouring identifies it as an art film. Add the fact the Spielberg felt personal about this story, and you'll realise how empty this claim is.
5) This film was released in 1993; I personally don't know many outstanding holocaust films from before 1993 (certainly a lot from after 1993), or if there were, they certainly weren't as bold as this one. A black and white film about a crude subject that keeps the viewer's attention for 3 hours and 15 minutes. Think about it. I personally believe that, unlike other films (this includes my favourite holocaust film, Son of Saul), gives a such wide view on the holocaust. This film shows most of the aspects of the holocaust, some overrdramatised, but nonetheless represented. It is really stupid to see this movie as unnecessary.
Conclusively, I'd like to point out that 6 million jews died due to the Holocaust. The only bigger genocide I know of is that of the native Americans, 18 million only in northen America. Seeing so many 1/10 reviews that base their claims on this being basically Jewish propaganda is worrying, especially considering the rise of right-wing ideologies that happened in the latter years. Are we forgetting history? I hope not. And, in case that's the truth, it's films like Schindler's list that remind us of that.
The main points of criticism that I saw are the following: 1) it manipulates facts; 2) presents a too distinct line between good jews and evil Nazis; 3) too emotional; 4) money grab; 5) "Holocaust is bad, we already knew it" (and this is an almost exact quote);
1) the claims for this point of criticism are that it portrays a positive figure of Oskar Schindler, exaggerates several aspects of the holocaust, and portrays essentially bad Nazis (we to this latter point in 2)); Let's get this straight: unlike some reviewers claim, Oskar Schindler didn't end up as an enriched Industrialist, as some reviewers wrongly claim. In other words, he didn't earn off the holocaust anything. On the contrary, he spent his entire fortune on bribes and corruption acts in order to aid his Jewish workers. He even had to escape to Argentina, as many Nazi officers did after WWII. As for the claims of overly dramatisation, that is certainly an aspect of the film. There are a few scenes which are not accurate (e.g. the shower scene - in real life, jews didn't fear the gas chamber as they where purposely misinformed). Generally, though, I didn't see that much of an overly dramatization. Most of the times, the film presented simply factual events. Jews were in fact killed and persecuted, there's nothing overly dramatized. Concentration camps where truly such bloody places as seen in the film. Instead, maybe it even downgraded violence quite a lot., still being incredibly bloody as a film.
2) Good jews vs. bad Nazis; I remember Hans Landa's monologue from the beginning of Inglorious Basterds, which centered on jews being rats in the sense that they're generally a population that could figure out a solution easily. Do not get me wrong here (obviously Landa stereotypes this immensely), but this is portrayed often, mainly in the first portion of the film. Jews going to the Synagogue to buy and sell instead of praying, some jews that join the police force and essentially collaborate with the Nazis, and some jews fight each other when hiding away during the ghetto persecution scene. I clearly would not say that all jews are good nor that all German soldiers are bad, but that shouldn't be a matter to be portrayed in a holocaust film. To see an avid jew, go watch "A Christmas Carol". As for "bad Nazis", I'd like to clear out again what is Nazional-Socialism. It was an extremist, right-wing movement that enhanced, in this case, Germany's national identity and superiority on the base of racial distinction, and urged violence on anyone that would not be member of the "superior" race. This movement, along with fascism, attracted a great deal of fanatics. I'd like to suggest the view of "Novecento", which similarly depicts the rise of fascism in Italy and its ruthless cruelty, carried on by it he insane and violent individuals which joined the party in the early twenties. I know that one movie depicted a Nazi soldier's moral division during WWII, called "Onore e Lealtà", which has low reviews for the same reason that prevents this film from portraying "good" Nazis: it is kind of dangerous, and can easily turn in a glorification of Nazis. Nonetheless, most of the cruelty is carried through a notorious war criminal, Amon Goeth.
3) Spielberg is of Jewish origins. As a filmmaker, he's considered this story very personal. Moreover, he is notorious for being emotional in his serious films.
4) It is well known that Spielberg chose to renounce for his fee as he considered it "blood money". Of course studios have to do a profit of their movies, but film is still a form of art. Movie makers of Spielberg's caliber do films without a simple capitalistic view of making money, but with the purpose of making an art work. Schindler's list is not a fancy action blockbuster, if nothing else, its black and white colouring identifies it as an art film. Add the fact the Spielberg felt personal about this story, and you'll realise how empty this claim is.
5) This film was released in 1993; I personally don't know many outstanding holocaust films from before 1993 (certainly a lot from after 1993), or if there were, they certainly weren't as bold as this one. A black and white film about a crude subject that keeps the viewer's attention for 3 hours and 15 minutes. Think about it. I personally believe that, unlike other films (this includes my favourite holocaust film, Son of Saul), gives a such wide view on the holocaust. This film shows most of the aspects of the holocaust, some overrdramatised, but nonetheless represented. It is really stupid to see this movie as unnecessary.
Conclusively, I'd like to point out that 6 million jews died due to the Holocaust. The only bigger genocide I know of is that of the native Americans, 18 million only in northen America. Seeing so many 1/10 reviews that base their claims on this being basically Jewish propaganda is worrying, especially considering the rise of right-wing ideologies that happened in the latter years. Are we forgetting history? I hope not. And, in case that's the truth, it's films like Schindler's list that remind us of that.