SCHINDLER'S LIST: 4K Blu-ray (Universal/Amblin, 1993) Universal Home Video
BEST PICTURE - 1993
Many years from
now, when the history books are written (or re-written, as the case may be) on
movie legends from the latter half of the twentieth century, one name in
particular should typify the distinction between those merely ‘working in the business’ and the
ever-dwindling roster of true creatives who made ‘movie art’. The name is Steven Spielberg. Spielberg’s gifts as a
storyteller are so immense and consistently satisfying, he has oft been merely
accepted as a genius without the word actually being ascribed alongside his
name. And while we are on the subject, lest we forget Spielberg has made his share
of duds too. But a flop – however epic – should never discount the virtues
expressed elsewhere in an artist’s repertoire. Even Hitchcock had his
disasters. And Spielberg, like Hitchcock, remains an irrefutable and enduring
craftsman of his generation. Now, Hollywood has had a rather curious love/hate
relationship with its own creative geniuses. Orson Welles was famously
defrocked as Hollywood’s wunderkind and 'enfant
terrible'. David Lean was eviscerated by the New York critics after the
debut of Ryan’s Daughter (1970); a
wound that sent Lean into purposeless and self-imposed exile for nearly a
decade, only to emerge with one final masterpiece up his sleeve. And Spielberg,
has intermittently been rebuffed as the purveyor of fluff and nonsense – all
show and no substance. Rubbish! Absolute, and all evidence to the contrary in Schindler’s List (1993).
Spielberg has
remained a ‘beloved’ of Hollywood (a
very fickle town, indeed) longer than most, perhaps singularly because his
movies continue to ring registers around the world, fattening the coffers of
whatever studio is lucky enough to assume distribution of his latest project.
Yet, he is as quietly reviled by the critics who cannot begin to challenge his
success, popularity or the diversity within his body of work, but would like to
suggest all these virtues are overshadowed by Spielberg’s own personal imprint
and directorial style. Like Cecil B. DeMille, Spielberg encompasses that rare
intuitiveness in knowing what the public wants to see even before they know it
for themselves. Such undiluted clairvoyance alone is mind-boggling. But let the
record also show that Spielberg has – with leeway given for a few
miscalculations along the way – rather consistently delivered the goods. Now,
Spielberg pundits will argue that he is little more than a popcorn salesman,
catering to the masses with homogenized mainstream pabulum guaranteed to fit
most any commercial taste. But this argument is only well-placed if one
critiques Spielberg’s art as simply that – Saturday matinee drivel. Certainly,
not all of his projects have adhered to a rich tapestry one might classify as cinema
art. Still, a remarkable selection from his filmography has endured both the
test of time and the snarl of critical disdain dogging his virtuosity.
Lest we forget,
here is the man who redefined the term ‘blockbuster’
with the release of Jaws in 1975;
the director who elevated sci-fi with thought-provoking and emotionally
sensitive melodramas like Close
Encounters of the Third Kind (1977) and E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial (1982), who revitalized the Saturday
matinee serial with Raiders of the Lost
Ark (1982), and then astonished even his die hard fan base, along with the
naysayers, by breaking from these child-like homages into heartfelt dramas: The Color Purple (1985), Empire of the Sun (1987) and Saving Private Ryan (1998), before
dazzling us with such technological and trend-setting breakthroughs as Jurassic Park (1993). Amidst this
weighty directorial career – currently totaling 58 features - Spielberg has
also either written or executive produced such eclectic box office dynamos as The Goonies (1985), Back to the Future (1985) Who Framed Roger Rabbit? (1988), and, War Horse (2011). And, as Mr. Spielberg
rounds out his 72nd year, as the highest-grossing director by
worldwide box office ($10.120 billion) of all time, he shows no signs of
slowing down, personally involved in 23 productions, far-reaching from the
pending new year into 2020!
No, when
Spielberg’s time on earth has ended, he will have left behind an indelible
legacy of peerless showmanship; compelling, astonishingly clairvoyant, and
memorable. The industry, as well as movie lovers, owe him a great debt. Yet,
Hollywood has honored Spielberg – the director – only once; though arguably,
for his most thought-provoking and passionate work to date: Schindler’s List. In retrospect the
honor is well-deserved. But is it also too little too late? Relying on the
historical record and a sprinkling of artistic license, Schindler’s List
accounts one of the darkest chapters in human history; beginning with the Nazi
occupation of Poland and one industrialist’s manifesto to save as many Jewish
exiles as he can from certain death in the concentration camps. Spielberg’s
attention to detail is impeccable; Allan Starski’s production design and Janusz
Kaminski’s elegantly stark B&W cinematography resurrecting the period in
all its terrifying moral ambiguity. Schindler's
List is often erroneously and rather unfairly compared to Shoah (1985); the French documentary
about the holocaust. The comparison is moot. One should no more attempt to
understand Spielberg’s movie as a companion piece, or even a rebuttal to Shoah
than say, mark a comparative exercise between Leni Riefenstahl’s Triumph of the Will (1935) and
Chaplin’s The Great Dictator (1940)
– both brilliant masterworks in their own right. Those seeking such parallels
ought first to appreciate Schindler’s
List – despite its historical content – as a work of ‘fiction’; meaning
that it endeavors, through dramatization of the facts, to recreate in an
artistic milieu, this harrowing tapestry of events from history without actually
reporting to be history itself. For most assuredly, Schindler’s List is simultaneously factual and artistic.
Spielberg's
greatest gift as a filmmaker has always been his ability to be frankly honest
and sincere with his audience without becoming preachy or coy. His best films
entertain in unexpected ways with a candor that quietly sneaks in the
unvarnished realities afflicting humanity and life. From this perspective
alone, Schindler’s List is a marvel,
its educative qualities never impugning the film’s ability to entertain. The
art in the exercise effectively blurs, though never obfuscates fact from
fiction. Perhaps owing to the severity of his subject matter, as well as his
own moral investment to create a fitting epitaph to the holocaust, Spielberg
tends to tread lightly on his artistic license herein. Based on Thomas
Keneally’s book, Steven Zallian’s screenplay begins in 1939 with the relocation
of Polish Jews to the Krakow ghetto. Oskar Schindler (Liam Neeson) is a roguish
playboy and businessman from Moravia with a devil-may-care penchant for high
living. A member of the Nazi party, Oskar latches onto the idea of establishing
a manufacturing plant to make army mess kits during the war. Knowing absolutely
nothing of how to begin this entrepreneurial venture, Oskar hires an official
from Krakow’s Judenrat to broker a relationship with Jewish laborers;
exploiting them for pure profit. Oskar also embarks on a campaign of lavish
bribes to ingratiate himself into the Nazi high command. His ruse works and he
is afforded the status of ‘Herrr
Direktor’ – an appointment implying a certain level of autonomy to operate
precisely as he wants under their radar.
By his nature,
Schindler is a rather lazy man who would rather carouse with cabaret girls than
put in an honest day’s work. However, what he ends up doing, thanks in part to
his bookkeeper Itzhak Stern (Ben Kingsley) is to save many otherwise slated for
extermination in the camps by having them listed as ‘essential workers’ for the
German war machine. To procure his favors while pretending to be on the side of
the Reich, Oskar befriends S.S. Lieutenant Amon Goeth (Ralph Fiennes) – a
brutal borderline psychotic, who derives a warped strength and purpose from the
most perverse pleasures; inflicting pain, fear and death on his Jewish
prisoners. Goeth has come to Kraków to oversee construction of the Płaszów
concentration camp. Upon its completion, the ghettos are liquidated by the
Nazis who arbitrarily murder anyone uncooperative and foolish enough to defy
them. This massacre, observed by Schindler and his latest paramour from a
hilltop on horseback, has a profound effect on Oskar. Yet Spielberg does the
film a great service by creating an even more conflicted crisis of conscience
in Amon Goeth, who suffers from a grotesquely distorted sense of self, a
misguided fury directed at the Jews, and, a warped sexual frustration that at
once draws him to desire a Jewish peasant from his camp. Yet, this strange
addiction also compels him to terrorize and beat her into submission after
suffering a nervous breakdown. What makes the madman…well…mad is at the heart
of this character critique, and, Spielberg and Fiennes amply flesh out Goeth’s
abused logic that could so completely disintegrate a man into a beast. It is
the complexity of Fiennes’ portrait of Goeth that makes him at once so
repugnant, strangely compelling and utterly terrifying all at once.
Oskar goads
Goeth with his own philosophy; imparting that the greatest power afforded any
man is his ability to pardon or forgive another for his indiscretions. Goeth is
confounded by this mantra, but tests it on the young Jewish manservant he has
employed to look after his house. However, when the servant slips up, Goeth
first pardons, then ruthlessly shoots him dead in the yard with his
high-powered rifle. Goeth is easily won over by Schindler’s aggressive charm
which he mis-perceives as sycophantic and loyal, if marginally manipulative.
But very soon Goeth begins to suspect Oskar’s performance may be just that – a
trick and smoke screen to keep the Nazis at bay. For his part, Oskar pretends
not to care about the byproduct of his philanthropy - the Jews. Still, along
the way, he rediscovers his own humanity - briefly reconciling with an
estranged wife, Emilie (Caroline Goodall). Oskar's penultimate realization
comes too late, though it is nevertheless profound: that in his pursuit of
riches he aspires to be an honorable man - his silent objection, deafening as
it speaks in defense of the defenseless. As it becomes increasingly apparent
the balance of power during the war is shifting against Germany, Oskar makes
ready to leave Kraków with a small fortune. Barring his conscience, Oskar,
together with Stern’s help, finagles an agreement with Goeth that will allow
him the relocation of his workers to a factory in Zwittau-Brinnlitz, far away
from the Final Solution. The cost of this bribe and another to spare a train
car of women inadvertently shipped to Auschwitz, financially cripples Oskar. At
war’s end, as a member of the Nazi party and ‘profiteer of slave labor’ Oskar
and his wife are forced to feel Germany or face execution by the advancing Red
Army. Oskar’s final philanthropy narrowly averts a catastrophe; instructing the
SS officers, who have been told to open fire on his Jewish factory workers, to
instead go home to their families as men - not murderers.
As he packs his
car to escape, the grateful employees assemble, providing Oskar with a letter
that explains he is not a criminal to them. Their parting gift is even more heartfelt;
a gold band forged from one worker’s dental bridge, inscribed with “Whoever saves one life saves the world
entire.” This penultimate farewell is fraught with contradictions. Only
now, does a very humble and tear-stained Oskar suddenly realize how little he
has accomplished and how much more he might have done with just a little more
personal sacrifice. Stern tenderly assures Oskar that history will be no
harsher a critic of his motives than his own conscience. The factory workers
are awakened the next morning to discover they have been liberated by a Soviet
dragoon. In the film’s extended epilogue, we witness the hanging of Amon Goeth
and see the real survivors of Schindler’s philanthropy gather around his
tombstone in Jerusalem; the B&W footage changing over to color as the cast
from the movie joins in placing their tributes upon Schindler’s grave. Ben
Kingsley is accompanied by the real-life widow of Itzhak Stern who died in
1969. A title card reveals that although
fewer than 4,000 Jews were left alive in Poland at war’s end more than 6,000
descendants of Schindler’s Jews remain active around the world today. In the
penultimate moment, Liam Neeson is the last man to place roses on Oskar Schindler’s
grave.
Some 25 years
later (gosh, has it been that long?!?), Schindler's
List remains undeniably unsettling – its emotional density making it a
weighty movie-going experience. Once seen, it can never be forgotten. However,
once seen, it also may be some time before one can screw their courage to the
sticking place again for a second viewing. The human atrocity that reached its
critical apex during Hitler’s rise to power has come to symbolize a level of
barbarism so uncanny and unspeakably remarkable that it continues to stagger
all common logic, even such as generally applied under the articles of war. And
Spielberg’s movie, while concentrating on the enormity of the holocaust, has
managed also to telescope its immensity into an intimate, and therefore, far
more heartrending saga, with counterpoints of humanity at its diabolical worst
and altruistic best. Liam Neeson's interpretation of Oskar Schindler as the
genuinely reformed opportunist, is both heartbreaking and heartfelt. Clearly,
the actor and his alter ego have undergone a transformation. Yet, in retrospect
we tend to focus more on Ralph Fiennes as the chillingly vial, yet strangely
charismatic and utterly doomed demigod, whose inner horrors have devoured his
soul. There is something guileless and terrifying about Fiennes’ penetrating
stare; like looking into the dead-eyed visage of a dolls’ head; seeing nothing
but the abyss onto which a haunting imagination can be projected to fill in the
blanks. Ben Kingsley's bookish keeper of
the faith, tallying survivors in quiet desperation, transmits all of the noble
tolerance and pang of compassion his employer initially lacks; a little of it
finally rubbing off in the end. A finer cast could not have been assembled.
Except for its
brief bookends and the sudden appearance of a young girl streaking through the
ghetto in a muted red top coat – a symbol of innocence lost and/or destroyed
during the Kristallnacht purge - the rest of the film has been brilliantly
conceived in B&W; the result, like viewing an extended vintage newsreel
rather than a Hollywood retelling of history some 50 years removed from its
actual events. Powerful and affecting, Schindler's
List remains the ‘high water’ mark of Steven Spielberg’s film-making - a
culmination of all that his years as a distinguished storyteller have evolved.
There is both economy yet depth to his narrative structure; Steven Zaillian’s
screenplay wasting no time on the thumbnail sketch of history, well known to
many, but wholly invested in the particulars of these narrowly colliding lives
with an almost David Lean-like precision for pictorial starkness. Not a single
shot is wasted. Not a moment comes across as false or strained. In the final
analysis, Schindler's List is a
great movie - not simply because of its subject matter, but because Spielberg
has mastered the integrity of his craft to tell a truth truthfully and yet
artistically – treading a fine line of distinction that elevates his movie to
the upper echelon of quality. It is impossible to argue with the results; more
difficult still for the Academy to have denied Spielberg his long overdue Best
Director/Best Picture Oscars for this monumental undertaking.
When Universal
Home Video initially released Schindler’s
List on DVD the results were anything but gratifying. In the first place,
the film was spread across a double-sided flipper disc. For another, the extras
were grossly limited. Schindler’s List on Blu-ray for its
20th anniversary presented us with the opportunity to appreciate Janusz
Kaminski’s startling monochromatic compositions in then state-of-the-art hi-def.
But now comes the 4K Blu-ray reimagining, supervised by Spielberg, and the
results are nothing short of superb. Where the Blu-ray’s B&W 1080p image
was merely pristine, this new 4K disc mounts a quantum leap forward, extolling
finite details and textures in skin, hair and clothing we could only guess at
before. Film grain has advanced considerably with astounding razor-sharp
clarity. Dolby Vision has perfected the upward levels of whites and grays with
superior contrast, minus the occasional banding artifacts that were present on
the standard Blu-ray, while darker scenes are immersed in a velvety patina of
rich and enveloping deep grays and blacks that never crush. The full-color
bookends explode with an expansive range of color saturation.
We also get a
new Dolby Atmos soundtrack that compliments the visuals while restrained in its
use of the 7.1 channels, the overheads employed only for the subtlest ambiance,
as in reverb from gunshots or echoing loudspeakers. It’s a potent, if
understated mix. Extras, save one, have all been ported over from the 20th
Anniversary Blu-ray and, in fact, are isolated to the standard Blu-ray disc
also included herein. The extras are as follows: the previously released and
hour-long ‘Voices from the List’
featurette and eleven minutes on the Shoah
Foundation. The only ‘new’ extra is a reunion piece, involving Spielberg
and various cast members, waxing affectionately at the Tribeca Film Festival
about the movie’s impact and longevity. Schindler’s
List is a movie that is screaming for a comprehensive audio commentary from
Spielberg. Why he never committed to offering one at the time the film was made
available for the first time on home video is an oversight unexplained and
baffling. Why no one at Universal Home Video has since offered Spielberg the
opportunity to revisit his opus magnum and partake of such an exercise is,
frankly, beyond me; especially for its 25th Anniversary! Bottom line: Uni has
done its homework where film preservation is concerned. Schindler’s List in 4K has never looked better. Very highly
recommended.
FILM RATING (out of 5 – 5 being the best)
5
VIDEO/AUDIO
5+
EXTRAS
2.5
Comments