Filmmakers and film critics confronting the Holocaust face a basic task – finding an appropriate language for that which is mute or defies visualization. How do we lead a camera or pen to penetrate history and create art, as opposed to merely recording events? What are the formal as well as moral responsibilities if we are to understand and communicate the complexities of the Holocaust through its filmic representations? Such questions seem increasingly pressing, for the number of postwar films dealing with the Nazi era is steadily growing. I had seen at least sixty such films from around the world by 1980; when I completed the first edition of this book in 1982, another twenty had been produced; and by 1988 there were approximately one hundred new films – forty fiction, sixty documentary – that merited inclusion.

My point of departure is therefore the growing body of cinematic work – primarily fiction – that illuminates, distorts, confronts, or reduces the Holocaust. Rather than prove a thesis, I wish to explore the degree to which these films manifest artistic as well as moral integrity. The focus is on the cinema of the United States, France, Poland, Italy, and Germany,1 because these countries have released the most significant, accessible, and available films about the Holocaust. This new edition also covers many recent films from Austria and the Netherlands. Throughout Eastern Europe, fine films have treated the effects of World War II, but they are difficult to see in the United States. (Titles are included in the Filmography.)