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Auschwitz - The Nazis And The Final Solution


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The most incredible place on earth - compelling viewing
Review date: 2008-09-12 Rating: 10 out of 10

Auschwitz should be included on the list of places a person should see before they die. Why? Well, despite it looking inhospitable and at certain times of the year, cold and hostile - it is also the place where one man tried to wipe an entire race of people off the face of the earth and given the number of people he targeted, it could be said he very nearly succeeded.

Yes, there are those out there who say Stalin and Mao killed many many more people but are there monuments to that today? In China, I would doubt it. The Nazis certainly did their best to wipe out the crematoria by blowing them up but what remains is a place where birds will not sing and screams could probably be heard from every place.

The BBC did an incredible job on this programme with their computer enhanced images and the role playing to allow the viewer to become more involved in the story telling. What amazed me was that there were people who actually managed to escape and live to tell the tale. However, was there any retribution to this? Who can say - but it is chilling viewing coupled with excellent research by Laurence Rees. Samuel West's narrative is very well done - how he must have felt reading the text and keeping his emotions in check, I cannot imagine.

My 2nd year history teacher told us of her trip to Auschwitz when I was a 14 year old in 1978. It was she who told us of the lack of birdsong. That image has never left me.

For those who care about man's inhumanity to man - this is a must see.

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Should be shown in every school...
Review date: 2008-07-06 Rating: 10 out of 10

The eye witness accounts including confessions of some of the SS guards and harrowing recollections of some of the survivors is shocking. What happened at Auschwitz wasn't just due to the Nazi participants but also to the collective blind eye that was the rest of Europe. I had never realised before that the camps could have been bombed but were not, or that other governments had refused refuge to the Jews trying to escape. I also now understand why this subject should never be forgotten or dismissed as having happened "in the past". Recent world events involving "ethnic cleansing" such as in Bosnia are reminders of how a "modern" cultured nation can still descend into this type of insane hell. This 6 part series should be shown to all school kids, as part of their curriculum.

Terrifying but essential viewing
Review date: 2008-06-30 Rating: 10 out of 10

Laurence Rees is one of the BBC's outstanding historical documentary producers and one of his principal interests is the havoc wrought in Europe by Hitler and his henchmen. Ten years ago, he gave us the six-part series "The Nazis, A Warning from History". This series, homing in on one aspect of Nazism, was broadcast on the BBC around the time of the 60th anniversary of Auschwitz' liberation by the Red Army in January 1945. When it was broadcast I was unable to tear myself away from the screen and I seized a copy of the 2-DVD set as soon as I saw it in the shops.
The series mixes actual footage, interviews with victims and perpetrators and computer generated images of the two main camps (the "administration centre" at the confluence of the Sola and Vistula rivers in Auschwitz itself and the later Auschwitz-Birkenau some 3km away, where most of the mass murder took place).
Rees, ably supported by series consultant Professor Sir Ian Kershaw, traces the story of Auschwitz from its beginnings in April 1940 to its liberation in January 1945. They show how its development was a reaction to different Nazi priorities as World War II progressed. It was only after the infamous Wannsee conference in January 1942 that it developed as an extermination camp, but throughout its life it was a centre for Polish political prisoners, Russian prisoners of war and only later did it become a death camp as well.
It is one thing to watch old, blurred black and white pictures and scratched films, but quite another to follow a CGI image through the dimly-lit changing rooms into an underground gas chamber, one of the four that were the final destination for over a million victims of Auschwitz. This is disturbing viewing, definitely not for the faint hearted, but neither should it be ignored if we are to avoid repeating this black episode in recent history.
One thing that struck me was a CGI view of the yard between blocks 10 and 11 of the main camp, the so-called "death yard". I watched the DVD to remind myself of Rees's comments a few days after a visit to Krakow in March 2007. During that visit I took the 60km or so journey to Auschwitz and was able to pause my DVD player at that stage, point to a particular spot on the screen and say "I stood right there a few days ago". That brought it home to me that this is living history.
At times frightening, at times heartbreaking, but always completely riveting.

Good but flawed
Review date: 2007-10-17 Rating: 8 out of 10

Like other reviewers I found this a must watch series and was gripped by it. However as I have studied the holocaust over many years I was horrified to see the manipulation of various aspects withing this series. If you saw The Nazis-A Warning From History, you would be expecting hard fact only in this series but oh no we get speculation and pandering to the myth of the gas chambers. I will be precise. One statement in voice over talks about the design and functionality of the gas chamber at Auschwitz. He said 'no plans exist of the gas chamber but if they did it would look something like this. Pardon? Read this statement again and like me you will start to question a lot of content in this otherwise tremendous series. I am not a holocause denier but as a jewish friend of mine once said on the subject 'we would be better off if we started with hard facts on the matter' Auschwitz was a terrible place where unimaginable things were done against many jews and others of course. But if you start to research the whole thing you begin to find more questions than answers. This series is however a must see but unlike one other reviewer having seen this programme I decided NOT to visit the place as I would lose my respect and compassion for the whole subject.

Auschwitz - final solution
Review date: 2006-06-26 Rating: 6 out of 10

A very indepth and informative DVD.
Just thought that with a 295mt documentary, we could have done with better b&w footages rather than reconstructions.
Also felt it could have been compiled in about 90-120 mts iso 245.
However, excellent BBC documentary, as always!

Product Details/Specifications


Director(s):

Recording label: 2 Entertain Video
Manufacturer: 2 Entertain Video
EAN: 5014503150525
Binding: DVD
Number of items: 2
Format: Box set, PAL, Widescreen,
Release date: 2005-02-14
Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
Audience rating: Suitable for 12 years and over
Region code: 2
Running time: 300 minutes
Language: English (Subtitled)
Language: English (Original Language)

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