Schindler's List

Spielberg's sensitive precision, Williams's music, Kaminsky's cinematography, Neeson's eyes, Fiennes's villain, Kingsley's everything, the little girl in the red dress walking through the black and white film... An unforgettable story. PS: Finally seen in the cinema on the occasion of the 25th anniversary. Indescribable experience. (01/15/2008)

If there is one single example of a film that is both excellent and thematically important, it is Schindler's List. Where else could you feel the indescribable horror and shame of the human deeds you have just seen, photographed in the most horrifying but at the same time most beautiful black and white composition imaginable? The scene with the little girl in the red coat, walking as a symbol of colourful innocence through pure hell, is probably the most powerful I have ever seen in a film, and it brings tears to my eyes every time; and even if it was the only one in the whole movie, I'd still never get this film out of my head – but it's not, not even close. Masterpiece. (05/05/2018)

Schindler's List is one of the best movies ever made by Steven Spielberg. It is a powerful story that is also told in places very brutally, which is quite surprising even for Spielberg, or at least it was surprising in 1993. Great performances by the actors, which are not undermined by Spielberg's typical pathos, even though it is very suppressed. (05/30/2016)

The right-wing view of the Holocaust is not something I agree with, but at the very least it's refreshing to be able to deal with it these days. Schindler's List could easily be read as a defense of capitalism, whose values are "supra-ideal" and pragmatic, making it incapable of the irrational evil that the Holocaust is generally considered to be (which is conveniently myopic, of course, since every young child knows about its economic motivations). Equally, it can be read as advocacy of a trickle-down economy, whereby a wealthy factory worker develops a relationship with his employees, tries to keep them, and gradually sees them as human beings whom he can use his abilities to save. That makes this film have far more problematic levels than the 100 times rehashed closing sentiment (as awful as it is). However, Spielberg and Kaminski (whose creative input here I tend to place higher than the director's; after all, look at what kind of cinematic leap this is from Jurassic Park or Hook) have managed to translate the methodical chaos of the Holocaust to the screen perfectly in several scenes here, creating the illusion of a documentary and a surreal nightmare at the same time, as the situation must have had on many in retrospect. Nemes's Son of Saul is a few paces farther ahead in this, but I think it stands on the foundation of what Schindler's List built in certain places. (01/13/2022)

Someone once described Schindler's List as the building block of Holocaust film history. Its influence confirms this, of course. Nicky's Family is not the only project that has taken inspiration from it almost literally, as Steven Spielberg simply chose to speak a universal language for academics and ordinary people alike. (10/15/2022)