299. Nuit et Brouillard

Nuit et Brouillard
Night and Fog
1955
Directed by Alain Resnais

This is the least disturbing picture I could find of the film; if you are a genuinely queasy person, I did not want to freak you out.

This is one of the shorter films (only a half hour) but it is probably one of the most intense films on the list.  This is a documentary of the concentration camps.  The film flips between photos from the Holocaust and pictures from ten years later.  Needless to say, it is extremely disturbing.

All of us are familiar with the Holocaust. Most of us have learned about it since as early as middle school.  I really thought I knew the most disturbing facts and that I knew all about the concentration camps.  I mean, we all have seen at least a dozen movies on the topic and probably have read a large number of books about it.  I even visited Anne Frank's house in Holland.

However, as I found out from this film, there are plenty of things I did not know (or want to know) about the genocide.  The theme of the movie is the idea that history will always repeat itself and the Holocaust could happen again and again (and, of course, since this film has come out, it has).  I am always amazed that it has been less than a hundred years since the Holocaust happened; I can't even imagine what it would be like watching this a mere ten years later.

If you are going to watch this film, be prepared to have it stick with you for the rest of your life.

RATING: ***** (I feel kind of weird rating this but it is a very emotional movie that will stick with me)

Interesting Facts:

Francis Truffaut considers this the greatest movie ever made.

Jean Cayrol, a Holocaust survivor, worked on the script.

One of the first films to deal with the Holocaust.