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Notable Nominees

Oscar-nominated films put a human face
on the Holocaust.

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This Month Featuring...

NAOMI PFEFFERMAN

PIZZA

Jewish Journal of Greater Los Angeles

TRAD 0 51A L

news of a contemporary genocide
emerged from over the border in
Yugoslavia. "I grew up thinking,
11 her life, Joan Stein has
`Never again,' and suddenly there it
been preoccupied with the
was, only hours from where I was liv-
Holocaust story that inspired ing," said Stein, who began traveling
er 2001 Oscar-nominated
three hours each way on a crowded bus
short film, One Day Crossing.
to volunteer at a refugee camp.
"My mother's brother was shot into
Eventually, she began using a video
the Danube River not long before the
camera to document the refugees' trau-
end of the war," Stein, 39, said tremu-
ma — an activity that changed her life.
lously. "It always haunted me that this
Stein vowed to become a filmmaker to
brave little boy tried to save his own
tell other important stories in a public
life, and he was only 6 years old."
way.
The stark, black-and-white drama —
While mulling over a topic for her
Stein's film-school master's thesis —
master's thesis at Columbia University,
focuses on a woman who must decide
the director kept returning to the story
whether to risk everything to hide a
of her Uncle Lajos and interviewed rel-
Jewish child from the Nazis. It's an
atives to learn more. She pieced togeth-
intensely personal saga for the director.
er that on Christmas Eve 1944, Lajos
"I was obsessed with completing this
and two friends escaped the soldiers
film," she said. "I knew I couldn't go
who had arrived to round them up at
on to other projects until I had told
their orphanage.
this story."
As bombs fell, the boys ran to a safe
Stein learned few of her family's
house where Lajos' mother was hiding;
Holocaust stories while growing up in
20 people had to hold her down to
a traditional Jewish home in Fairlawn,
prevent her from running into the
N.J. Her mother found it painful to
street. Not long thereafter, a duplici-
discuss the past: "She suffered from
tous neighbor turned Lajos and his
nightmares, and she didn't sleep, so I
friends over to members of the Arrow
didn't feel it was right to press her," the
Cross (the Hungarian Nazis), who
director said.
promptly marched them to the river's
Stein, too, suffered from nightmares,
edge.
which caused her to awaken in the
One boy jumped into the water to
night with a sense of fear and dread. "I
elude the gunfire; little Lajos was not
dreamed that people were coming to
so lucky.
take me away because I was Jewish,
Stein, who collaborated with screen-
though I lived in a suburban neighbor- writer Christina Lazaridi on the short,
hood that was largely Jewish," she
raised $50,000 to shoot the
recalled.
Hungarian-language drama in
When young Joan forced herself to
Budapest with Hungarian actors in
look at images of the concentration
May 1999.
camps, she keenly gazed into the vic-
She was shocked when her film
tims' eyes. "I tried to see the faces, even earned the gold medal at the 2000
on the corpses," she said. "Even as a
Student Academy Awards, the
child, I had to see who they were."
Director's Guild student prize and
After earning her MBA from
finally, the Oscar nomination.
Georgetown University, Stein's fixation
Even more rewarding has been the
upon the past led her to relocate to
response from her family. "My mother
Hungary — over her parents' protests
wept when she watched the movie,
— to work as a business consultant. "I
because she felt her brother had been
wanted to learn about my family's his-
remembered," said Stein, who is now
tory, and my history," she explained.
working on a feature-length film that
Sitting at a Passover seder with mem-
also touches on the subject of the
bers of Budapest's Jewish community,
Holocaust.
she felt joy that Hitler had not eradi-
"All my relatives feel the film will
cated Hungarian Jewry.
She was devastated, however, when
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