Entertainment

"Schindler's List" Through Actor's Eyes

MICHAEL ELKIN SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH NEWS

H

e is a movieland
Marlboro Man, with
no match on screen
these days.
Tall and strapping, puffing
away at cigarettes that seem
dwarfed in his hands, Liam
Neeson is a mix of vice and
virtue, much like the man he
plays on screen.
Mr. Neeson stars as Oskar
Schindler in Schindler's
List, director Steven
Spielberg's adaptation of the
fact-based Thomas Keneally
novel about the Christian
businessman whose bottom
line instinct was to save the
more than 1,000 Jews who
worked for him during the
Holocaust.
As actor Liam Neeson
notes, Mr. Schindler was a
Holocaust hero who came to
his role as savior with a less

than pristine past. A busi-
nessman who traded in
bribes and the blackmarket,
Mr. Schindler used his Jews
as unpaid laborers in a fac-
tory processing mess kits
and kitchenware for war
use.
"We like our heroes whiter
than white, with haloes
around their heads," says
Mr. Neeson, a halo of smoke
engulfing his own head as he
speaks.
"But in reality, Schindler
was a man of vices and vir-
tues, (qualities) which
helped save lives."
Indeed, Mr. Schindler, who
at first bribed Nazi corn-
mandants to assure his plant
production rolled along
smoothly, was soon bribing
them to save the lives of
those Jews who made his

"list," so-called essential
workers for continued
success of the factory and
war effort.
The Irish Catholic actor,
whose movie credits include

Excalibur,Darkman, Shin-
ing Through and Husbands
and Wives, needed to hus-

band his energy during 72
days of shooting in Poland,
as he fought off the bitter
cold of Krakow and the chill-
ing shrouds of the past.
"I haven't quite gotten
over the experience," says
the actor.
"In Poland, I found myself
going to mass more than I
normally did. I found myself
asking questions, What is
God? Where is God?"
Unanswerables questions
to be sure, but in Oskar
Schindler's case — that of a

Liam Neeson as German industrialist Oskar Schindler.

man who began the war
wearing a button with a
swastika insignia and who
swilled spirits along with

Nazis, befriending bar-
barians to assure business
success — there were hints
of God's guidance. ❑

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