Schindlers List (Reflection Paper) by: Poll Anthony R.

Santillan

What makes a movie good is the emotional impact. Ive never actually spelled out what criteria I use to qualify a movie as thumbs up or thumbs down but Schindlers List by Steven Spielberg, I can say, is a thumbs up one. It, indeed, got me to an emotional level especially that it is based on a true story. Ive never seen a picture carried out with such emotion before. This movie will go down in history as a classic.

FORM/MEDIUM

Cinematography

The movies open with a small color scene and then it moves into black and white. This adds a sense of reality to the film. The sets are darker or lighter than the people in the scenes, so they would not blend. The costumes were also distinguished from skin tones or colors being used for the sets. These made the movie more believable and heart-wrenching. Spielberg makes us feel as if we're living inside the 20th century's darkest- and most defining-episode. Symbols

There is also the significance of symbolism in this scene with the use of a child as a symbol of hope and innocence. This manipulation of the truth (there were no children in concentration camps they were killed off much sooner) is clever by Spielberg. The constant use of children and the elderly to create a distressing image for the viewer to emote with throughout the film makes for a more empathetic bond to be formed. This in turn creates a more emotionally active film.

THE SUBJECT MATTER Self-sacrifice Oskar Schindler, a rich factory owner, risks his life and spends his personal fortune to save Jews listed as his workers during World War II. Schindler risks everything to help the Jews escape the Holocaust. He continually risked his life to protect and save his Jewish workers. He desperately spent every penny he had bribing and paying off the Nazis to get food and better treatment for his Jews. Nobody was hit at his factory, nobody murdered, nobody sent to death camps like the nearby Auschwitz. Courage Oskar Schindler is a German man and he should be against the Jews, in an idealistic way in Nazi Germany, but he is against the Third Reich.

THE STYLE Schindler's List is rated R. There are many nudity scenes, but they are necessary for the film to have such an impact. The gore is plenty but also necessary. Maybe the only thing not necessary in the movie are the sex scenes. We knew Schindler was a womanizer, but the performance was so good, that we didn't even have to see it happen. There is a fair amount of profanity and vulgarity but everything in the film is pretty much necessary to make it believable.