The last of the unjust

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Movie
German title The last of the unjust
Original title Le Dernier des Injustes
Country of production France , Austria
original language French , German
Publishing year 2013
length 218 minutes
Rod
Director Claude Lanzmann
script Claude Lanzmann
production Thibault Mattei
Iris Wegscheider (Dor-Film, Vienna)
camera Caroline Champetier ,
William Lubtchansky
cut Chantal Hymans

The Last of the Unjust (French original title: Le Dernier des injustes ) is a nearly four-hour interview film with Benjamin Murmelstein , completed by Claude Lanzmann in 2013 ; the name is also the title of a book published in 2011 by Ronny Loewy and Katharina Rauschenberger about Murmelstein and his 1975 interview with Lanzmann.

The rabbi Murmelstein was a functionary of the resolution by the Nazis Jewish Community Vienna and the as forced organ then appointed Jewish Council in Vienna (under the similar-sounding name of "Jewish Community of Vienna"). He was also the last of the Jewish elders appointed by the National Socialists and forced to do so in the Theresienstadt ghetto in Terezín .

The title of the film goes back to Murmelstein, who once described himself in relative terms as the "last of the unjust". He alludes to the Talmudic designation of the last savior of the Jews from God as the righteous (Tzaddik) . Only Benjamin Murmelstein and Claude Lanzmann can be seen as interview partners or actors in the film.

content

This documentation is based on an interview conducted by Lanzmann with Murmelstein in Rome in 1975 , which lasted a total of eleven hours over a period of one week. Lanzmann did not use the resulting film material for his 1985 documentary " Shoah ".

In the interview, Murmelstein reported on the time and his work as a Jewish functionary in Vienna who was appointed by the National Socialists, who helped to organize the exit applications, and as a Jewish elder in the Theresienstadt ghetto. He told of his forced contacts with SS leader Adolf Eichmann .

With this film Lanzmann wanted to restore the reputation of Murmelstein's long controversial figure. Because this was attested by some to have done the humanly possible for his fellow religionists under extremely difficult circumstances - others demanded the death penalty for him.

In an interview about the film, Lanzmann called Murmelstein a “hero” who “fought against the murderers to the last”. Murmelstein was said to have been "very unjust" and the film should "make amends".

From July to November 2012, recordings of the interview sequences with Murmelstein, recorded in 1975, were filmed in today's ghetto museum in Terezín, in which Lanzmann discusses the criminal living conditions prevailing there at the time and the atrocities committed.

A German journalist rated the film as follows: “Claude Lanzmann is a mercilessly precise interviewer who does not allow easy explanations. Murmelstein, on the other hand, is a rhetorically brilliant narrator who spreads the prehistory of the extermination of the Jews by the Nazis with obscuring propaganda coups such as the plan for the emigration of Polish Jews to Madagascar and also clears up the legend of the simple bureaucrat Eichmann ”.

production

In 2013 the documentary was shown out of competition at the 66th Cannes Festival , ie not as part of a competition. It was released in French cinemas in autumn 2013. The cinema release in Germany is on May 7, 2015.

The film was funded by: Austrian Film Institute, Vienna Film Fund, Center national du cinéma et de l'image animée and Région Île de France. It was created with the television participation of ORF (film / television agreement), Canal Plus, France Télévision, France 3 Cinéma and Cine +. Filming locations were Vienna, the Czech Republic, Poland and Israel. The new material was shot from July to November 2012 and the documentation was completed in spring 2013.

literature

  • Ronny Loewy , Katharina Rauschenberger (ed.): "The Last of the Unjust": The Jewish Elder Benjamin Murmelstein in Films 1942–1975. (= Scientific series of the Fritz Bauer Institute . Volume 19). Campus Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 2011, ISBN 978-3-593-39491-6 . (The book does not deal with this version of Lanzmann's film)
  • Claude Lanzmann: The Last of the Unjust . Rowohlt, Reinbek near Hamburg 2017, ISBN 978-3-499-63210-5 .
  • Rudolf Mach: The Zaddik in Talmud and Midrash . Brill, Leiden 1957. (On the roots of the play on words in the film title)

Web links

Reviews

and much more

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Josef Schnelle: The Last Elder of the Jews from Theresienstadt "The Last of the Unjust" by Claude Lanzmann at the Cannes Film Festival. on dradio.de, May 22, 2013.
  2. ↑ The Last of the Unjust - Benjamin Murmelstein, filmed by Claude Lanzmann (pdf; 95 kB)
  3. ^ Murmelstein rehabilitation. Claude Lanzmann's "The Last of the Unjust" on http://www.3sat.de/
  4. ↑ Claude Lanzmann in conversation: The puppet was able to pull the strings , in: FAZ of May 27, 2013, p. 27.
  5. ↑ Josef Schnelle: The Last Elder of the Jews from Theresienstadt "The Last of the Unjust" by Claude Lanzmann at the Cannes Film Festival. on dradio.de, May 22, 2013.
  6. ↑ Josef Schnelle is quoted: The last Jewish elder from Theresienstadt "The last of the unjust" by Claude Lanzmann at the Cannes Film Festival. on dradio.de, May 22, 2013.
  7. ↑ The last of the unjust. Filmdienst , 9/15, accessed on April 28, 2015 .
  8. ↑ filminstitut.at , accessed May 22, 2013.