“World Reduced to Ashes”
- a conversation with Mr. Emil Weis, director of the documentary “Sonderkommando Auschwitz-Birkenau.”
After your program was screened, a heated discussion flared up. Why do you think the movie evoked so many emotions?
To be honest, I don’t know. I suspect that the main reason is its topic, the Sonderkommando units, or work squads made up of prisoners from concentration camps formed to cover up the evidence of the Nazi slaughter. The span of life of an average member was four months. The first thing that a new work squad member did was burn the bodies of his predecessors. For many years some pressure groups would not allow this topic to be even touched upon, fearing that the people who were in the Sonderkommando would be seen as traitors. Of course, I’m not the first person who has taken up this topic.
To be honest, I don’t know. I suspect that the main reason is its topic, the Sonderkommando units, or work squads made up of prisoners from concentration camps formed to cover up the evidence of the Nazi slaughter. The span of life of an average member was four months. The first thing that a new work squad member did was burn the bodies of his predecessors. For many years some pressure groups would not allow this topic to be even touched upon, fearing that the people who were in the Sonderkommando would be seen as traitors. Of course, I’m not the first person who has taken up this topic.
What were your inspirations? What were you searching for? Why the Holocaust?
The first film I ever made, together with Samuel Fuller, a director from the American independent cinema, was also about the Holocaust. Sam himself introduced me to the subject; he told me about the traumatic events in the concentration camp in Slovakia. Yet another person was Leon Poliakov, who put special emphasis on making the public aware of the problem of anti-Semitism as well as racism. He was the first that lead to the lawsuits against the Nazis. He compiled a list of people who died in concentration camps using the format of a phonebook.
Where do the stories presented in the movie come from?
They were three manuscripts discovered coincidentally by people after the war. They were written by the members of Sonderkommando. There were also four diaries written after the war, diaries of people who had survived, and whom I met. These stories different considerably one from another. The manuscripts were written systematically and are a terrifying testimony of those days, a dry report. The diaries are more poetic, written in a more graceful language, as in the case of Zalman Gradowski.
Why do you think the events of the past are so important to the modern viewer?
Not seeing a person as a “person” is fascism. Let’s look at what’s going on in the modern world. The 9-11 attacks was also a fascist attack. Danger will always exist. My movies are to sensitize and serve as a warning. They are the heart of the whole topic.
Any plans for the future?
I’m going back to Auschwitz in a couple of months to film the second part. This time I plan on focusing on medical experiments and sterilization trials. I’m thinking about making a “triptych” about Auschwitz.
Gabriela Jatkowska
