us-005578-irn1004165
biographical history: Claude Lanzmann was born in Paris to a Jewish family that immigrated to France from Eastern Europe. He attended the Lycée Blaise-Pascal in Clermont-Ferrand. His family went into hiding during World War II. He joined the French resistance at the age of 18 and fought in the Auvergne. Lanzmann opposed the French war in Algeria and signed a 1960 antiwar petition. From 1952 to 1959 he lived with Simone de Beauvoir. In 1963 he married French actress Judith Magre. Later, he married Angelika Schrobsdorff, a German-Jewish writer, and then Dominique Petithory in 1995. He is the father of Angélique Lanzmann, born in 1950, and Félix Lanzmann (1993-2017). Lanzmann's most renowned work, Shoah, is widely regarded as the seminal film on the subject of the Holocaust. He began interviewing survivors, historians, witnesses, and perpetrators in 1973 and finished editing the film in 1985. In 2009, Lanzmann published his memoirs under the title"Le lièvre de Patagoni" (The Patagonian Hare). He was chief editor of the journal"Les Temps Modernes" which was founded by Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir, until his death on July 5, 2018. https://www.newyorker.com/culture/postscript/claude-lanzmann-changed-the-history-of-filmmaking-with-shoah Some women central to the production of"Shoa" (1985) include Hebrew interpreter, Francine Kaufmann; Polish interpreter, Barbra Janicka; Yiddish interpreter, Mrs. Apflebaum; assistant directors, Corinna Coulmas and Irena Steinfeldt; editors, Ziva Postec and Anna Ruiz; and assistant editor, Yael Perlov.
title: Rudolf Vrba - Auschwitz
identifier: irn1004165
has or had identifier: http://lod.ehri-project-test.eu/units/us-005578-irn1004165/alternateIDs/1
note: Rudolf Vrba is in SHOAH (1985). The parts of his interview in the final release are not available at USHMM. Claude Lanzmann spent twelve years locating survivors, perpetrators, and eyewitnesses for his nine and a half hour film Shoah released in 1985. Without archival footage, Shoah weaves together extraordinary testimonies to render the step-by-step machinery of the destruction of European Jewry. Critics have called it"a masterpiec" and a"monument against forgetting" The Claude Lanzmann SHOAH Collection consists of roughly 185 hours of interview outtakes and 35 hours of location filming.
has end date: http://lod.ehri-project-test.eu/dates/1985-12-31
has or had some members with language: eng
has record set type: Item
has beginning date: http://lod.ehri-project-test.eu/dates/1985-01-01
type: RecordSet
date: November 1978
note: There are several cuts (time codes are noted) corresponding to the parts of the interview that were used in the final film. In some cases the cut corresponds exactly to the black screen and in some cases the audio continues over the black screen and the cut occurs when the picture returns. Staff-curated clips include: Clip 1, Film ID 3226, 01:02:34 - 01:22:09 Clip 2, Film ID 3228, 03:10:24 - 03:21:31 Clip 3, Film ID 3228, 03:22:40 - 03:33:40 Clip 4, Film ID 3232, 07:00:28 - 07:17:01 Clip 5, Film ID 3234, 09:11:36 - 09:27:29
has or had holder: us-005578
scope and content: Rudolf Vrba was a Slovakian Jew who escaped from Auschwitz in April 1944 in hopes of warning the world about the imminent destruction of the Hungarian Jews and inciting the Jews to revolt. He describes working on the arrival ramp for ten months and witnessing as Jews from various countries went to the gas chambers. He and Lanzmann debate the culpability of the Jewish council members and other Jewish leaders, who Vrba describes as traitors who collaborated with the Nazis. FILM ID 3226 -- Camera Rolls #98,99 -- 01:00:00 to 01:22:24 CR 98: Rudolf Vrba and Claude Lanzmann sit on a bench in Central Park. It is fall and they wear warm clothing. Initially both Lanzmann and Vrba appear in the frame but then the camera zooms in to focus on Vrba's face. He smiles as he tells parts of the story; it is slightly incongruous because of the nature of what he is discussing. Vrba says that he is not sure if the statistics about the number of escapes from Auschwitz are correct or not. [CLIP 1 BEGINS] He escaped in order to give warning about the impending deportation and destruction of the Hungarian Jews. He also wanted to survive. Vrba says that when he was first instructed by the Jewish community leaders in Slovakia to present himself for deportation it never occurred to him to actually follow such a"stupi" order. In his opinion many Jews were too accustomed to conformity and to following those who had a high social or religious status. He escaped from Auschwitz in April 1944 because he hoped that his information about the impending deportations would spread panic and slow down the killing process. CR 99: 01:11:13 Vrba and Lanzmann discuss Vrba's use of the word"voluntar" to describe those Jews who arrived as instructed for deportation. Vrba says that at Auschwitz the Germans' method was to kill many prisoners in reprisal if anyone attempted to fight back. If he risked his life in order to bring the message of what was happening at Auschwitz, then his survival was justified. Vrba s…
has or had identifier: http://lod.ehri-project-test.eu/units/us-005578-irn1004165/alternateIDs/2