Film
Steven Spielberg, Honored by USC Shoah Foundation, Cautions Against Rise of Extremism
On March 25, 2024, Steven Spielberg, the winner of three Academy Awards, was honored by the University of Southern California, 30 years after founding the school’s Shoah Foundation and releasing the landmark Holocaust film “Schindler’s List.”
Spielberg denounced the “rise of extremist views” and called for people to use “the power of empathy” against antisemitism or anti-Muslim hate. He also spoke out on behalf of both those killed by Hamas terrorists on Oct. 7 and innocent women and children killed in Gaza.
“We can rage against the heinous acts committed by the terrorists of Oct. 7 and also decry the killing of innocent women and children in Gaza,” the filmmaker and Shoah Foundation founder said as he accepted the University of Southern California’s highest honor, the University Medallion. “This makes us a unique force for good in the world. And here’s why we are here today to celebrate the work of the Shoah Foundation, which is more crucial now than it even was in 1994.”
Variety: ‘Over 1,000 Jewish Creatives and Professionals Have Now Denounced Jonathan Glazer’s ‘Zone of Interest’ Oscars Speech in Open Letter (EXCLUSIVE)’
More than 1,000 Jewish creatives, executives and Hollywood professionals have signed an open letter denouncing Jonathan Glazer’s “The Zone of Interest” Oscar speech.
The list of co-signees provided to _Variety _Monday morning covers a broad swath of the industry including actors (Debra Messing, Tovah Feldshuh), executives (Gary Barber, Gail Berman), creators (Amy Sherman-Palladino), directors (Eli Roth, Rod Lurie), producers (Lawrence Bender, Amy Pascal, Hawk Koch, Sherry Lansing) and representatives (UTA’s Jake Fenton, Gersh’s Jeffrey Greenberg, attorney Craig Emmanuel). About 500 more individuals have added their names to the nearly 500 who signed on when the open letter was first published.
The group’s statement says: “We refute our Jewishness being hijacked for the purpose of drawing a moral equivalence between a Nazi regime that sought to exterminate a race of people, and an Israeli nation that seeks to avert its own extermination.”
Glazer declined to comment.
The full statement and a current list of co-signees follows:
We are Jewish creatives, executives and Hollywood professionals.
We refute our Jewishness being hijacked for the purpose of drawing a moral equivalence between a Nazi regime that sought to exterminate a race of people, and an Israeli nation that seeks to avert its own extermination.
Every civilian death in Gaza is tragic. Israel is not targeting civilians. It is targeting Hamas. The moment Hamas releases the hostages and surrenders is the moment this heartbreaking war ends. This has been true since the Hamas attacks of October 7th.
The use of words like “occupation” to describe an indigenous Jewish people defending a homeland that dates back thousands of years, and has been recognized as a state by the United Nations, distorts history.
It gives credence to the modern blood libel that fuels a growing anti-Jewish hatred around the world, in the United States, and in Hollywood. The current climate of growing antisemitism only underscores the need for the Jewish State of Israel, a place which will always take us in, as no state did during the Holocaust depicted in Mr. Glazer’s film.
‘The Zone of interest’: A ‘Vacuous’ Movie
Manohla Dargis writing for The New York Times:
What is the point of “The Zone of Interest”? I’ve seen Jonathan Glazer’s movie twice, and each time I’ve returned to this question, something that I rarely feel compelled to ask. Movies exist because someone needs or wants to make art, tell a story, drive home a point, defend a cause, expose a wrong or simply make money. All that is clear from what’s onscreen is Glazer has made a hollow, self-aggrandizing art-film exercise set in Auschwitz during the Holocaust.
In “The Zone of Interest,” Glazer doesn’t simply tell a story; in his use of art-film conventions he provides a specific frame through which to watch it. This is clearly part of its attraction as is the breathing space his approach creates: it is scary, but not too.
These conventions can create a sense of intellectual distance and serve as a critique, or that’s the idea. They also announce (fairly or not) a filmmaker’s aesthetic bona fides, seriousness, sophistication and familiarity with a comparatively rarefied cinematic tradition. They signal that the film you’re watching is different from popular ones made for a mass audience. These conventions are markers of distinction, of quality, which flatter filmmakers and viewers alike, and which finally seem to me to be the biggest point of this vacuous movie.
Producer of an Oscar-Winning Holocaust Film Offended by Jonathan Glazer’s Remarks at the 96th Oscars
Richard Trank, Academy Award-winning producer of the 1997 Holocaust documentary ‘The Long Way Home’, writing in The Hollywood Reporter:
Jonathan Glazer made a powerful film based on an incredibly powerful book. Sadly, his arrogant performance accepting his Oscar has diminished that achievement for people like me as well as my family and friends. He can return to England to what I assume is a very comfortable home while many of his fellow British Jews continue trying to figure out a way to leave the U.K. Hundreds of thousands of Israelis are homeless in the south and now in the north, under attack by Hamas’ ally Hezbollah, backed by Iran. It’s unclear whether these facts trouble Jonathan Glazer as he calls for people to “resist” and equates Israel with Nazi Germany. One thing I do know is that many** **Jews around the world were outraged and disgusted by what the Oscar winner had to say at this year’s Academy Awards. And joining that group, I would say that if we are going to resist or refute anything, it’s statements like the one issued by Jonathan Glazer.