- Told through the memories and drawings of little Genio and narrated by family friend, Bernard Bragg, 'Memories of the Warsaw Ghetto' is a docudrama film about a boyhood resident of that Ghetto, Dr. Eugene Bergman. Deafened early in the war, Genio and his family struggle to survive persecution in Nazi occupied Poland. Behind the Ghetto wall, they find a community of people who refuse to let the Germans strip them of their identity. A community that keeps their culture, their family, and their love alive. But the Germans are determined to destroy them, and their determination is deadly.
- Memories of the Warsaw Ghetto is a docudrama based on a screenplay by a survivor of that Ghetto, Dr. Eugene Bergman. Many books and films about the Holocaust emphasize the Nazi's persecution and mass murder of millions of Europe's Jews. 'Memories of the Warsaw Ghetto' is a more positive story of the struggle of a people to retain their humanity, culture and dignity in spite of these horrors.
The film opens with three boys playing in a street in Poland. One swings a stick, striking a piece of wood that sails far into the air, hitting a soldier. Damned kike, spawn of hell! The soldier swings his riffle butt, hitting young Genio in the head, causing permanent deafness. So begins young Genios experience of one of the darkest times in human history.
The narration is documented with stills and archival footage. It is interwoven with reenactments and live scenes focusing on the experiences of Eugenes family and his uncle Borys. The father becomes a smuggler. A brother joins the underground. Borys becomes a policeman and undergoes a crisis of conscience. Their fates reflect the rise and fall of the Ghetto.
The central theme of this film is that the Warsaw Ghetto was not just a charnelhouse but the site of a rich and thriving cultural life of its inhabitants. Inside that thronged and walled-in enclave, so long as they did not die of starvation and the cold, the Ghettoites tried to preserve the rich cultural and spiritual values of Judaism. There were concerts, literary evenings, at least half a dozen theaters offering a variety of plays, choral ensembles, and ballet performances. There was even a Jewish symphony orchestra. There was also a ramified system of underground university classes.
Finally, the film deals with the Ghetto Uprising of 1943, the first armed revolt in Nazi-occupied Europe, and the remarkable young people who took part in it. The enormous physical stresses they lived under only strengthened their spirit.
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