User Reviews

After eleven years of work, filmmaker Claude Lanzmann finally released Shoah, the longest and most comprehensive documentary of the extermination of the Jews during World War II. At 10 hours in length, it's a real chore to watch but this film doesn't focus so much on his final product but on Lanzmann's personal efforts to get the film made. Very few clips from his epic film are shown but instead the film consists of interviews with Lanzmann and others as well as some never before shown footage Lanzmann secretly shot for Shoah but never actually used. You also learn about about Lanzmann's personal life and relationships...but only a bit. In many ways, the documentary was interesting but it left you feeling as if Lanzmann's story was still quite incomplete. The film was also the weakest of the nominees for Best Documentary Short.

UPDATE: "A Girl in the River" took the Oscar for Best Documentary Short.

Fascinating in-depth exploration of the mind-set that enabled Lanzmann to create the groundbreaking documentary Shoah and some of the choices he had to make in order to achieve what he did. I saw Shoah on video in the 1970s but had forgotten that one of its most interesting aspects other than its length was that it was made entirely without archival footage. This making-of featurette opened my eyes about its other qualities -- mostly qualities in Lanzmann -- that make Shoah the great work of art it is.

Two unforgettable passages: In one Lanzmann describes how it took him months to track down in impossible circumstances a former death camp barber, whom he finally found still working as a barber in a small village. The story of how he found him is fascinating in itself and shows why it took Lanzmann twelve years to make the original documentary. Then he describes how he decided to interview this barber while he was in the act of cutting someone's hair, in order to help elicit sense memories of his time in the camps. The camera slowly moves in on the barber's face as not only his hands but his memory are working and he is asked one question after another. The gradual metamorphosis of his features from flatness to anguish is very moving. There is a sense here, and throughout the movie, that there is much more unsaid.

Later Lanzmann is interviewing a former Sonderkommando who dispassionately and off-handedly, with no emotion whatsoever, as though he is talking about spilt milk, describes piles and piles of naked corpses that were burning in the trenches. Only one thing causes him to break his poker face and speak with any emotion or force, and it's not about any of the people or crimes he witnessed but when he recalls how bitter cold the weather was.

I didn't realize how short the movie was - only 40 minutes. I would have liked more. Lanzmann is a unique artist, uncompromising and incredibly committed to the truth in all its aspects. This aspect of his personality and artistic process is worth a full-length movie. "Spectres" requires a certain level of interest and inquisitiveness from the viewer. It caters to those who tend to think and ponder and evaluate. If you're looking for thrills and the height of drama in their most obvious manifestations, you will be disappointed. To me, there is tremendous drama in what Lanzmann achieved, in the choices he made, and in his artistic process and commitment. Observing these was more dramatic and affecting to me than the most riveting thriller or even the most harrowing holocaust footage. Comcast idiotically gave this film one star in its rating - but if you're not that committed to this topic, or to inquiries about the nature of art and people, and you just want to be entertained, you may not love it either.

A film critic once said "It's not what a movie is about, it's how it is about it." This idea must be kept in mind when evaluating Claude Lanzmann: Spectres of the Shoah. Specters is founded upon the perfect topic. Lanzmann is a creator of a film that is more than a film, the definitive Holocaust documentary, one of the most important accomplishments in cinema history. However, the method of this movie is relatively unimaginative, uncovering no profound insight.

Spectres opens with a few film personalities lauding Shoah. Lanzmann is introduced as complex, temperamental, and genius. After this brief introduction, the remaining film is an interview intercut with clips from Shoah and other archival footage. Lanzmann is dynamically shot from a variety of angles and distances, but is face is constantly partially obscured by shadows. This is an attractive look with obvious connotations. This man is a ghostly hero, permanently marred by his herculean labor. This melodrama provides unnecessary legitimacy to his pessimistic attitude. Specters revisits many of the most iconic moments in Shoah and asks Lanzmann to elaborate. He emphasizes the emotional pain, brotherhood, danger, but all of these themes were infinitely better communicated in Shoah itself. All efforts devoted to expanding the scope beyond Shoah are woefully pedestrian. Lanzmann anecdotes and history are reasonably interesting, but they fail to coalesce into greater themes. Specter's best moments are simply when it helps us remember Shoah. Maybe my expectations are too high. One interview and some basic biography research just seems insufficient.

Claude Lanzmann: Spectres of Shoah could at best serve as an introduction to the topic. Hopefully this inspires those who understand this is not the definitive retrospect. I just worry this is a topic that can score a free Oscar. Awards are just awards, but they can trick people into thinking accolades are metrics of merit. I hope we can recognize films with quality beyond content.

If you like true stories told very well, but briefly, and you'd like to get a leg up in an Oscar pool, then this review is for you! In my continuing effort to see as many Oscar nominees as possible, I took advantage of the opportunity to see the shorts.TV theatrical presentation "Oscar Nominated Short Films 2016: Documentary" (NR, 3:00 – with 10 min. intermission). Here's a brief, spoiler-free summary and evaluation of one of those five films...

"Claude Lanzmann: Spectres of Shoah" (40 min.) – This film tells the story of French filmmaker and author Claude Lanzmann, focusing mainly on his challenges in taking twelve years to film and edit his nine-and-a-half-hour-long 1985 Holocaust oral history film "Shoah". After some short interviews testifying to Lanzmann's brilliance and the accomplishment that is "Shoah", Lanzmann himself tells his own story and we see footage from Shoah plus some footage Lanzmann short, but didn't use in the film. This doc calls to mind the engrossing 1991 feature doc "Heart of Darkness: A Filmmaker's Apocalypse" about Francis Ford Coppola's struggles making 1979's "Apocalypse Now". "Spectres of Shoah" generates audience interest in some of the stories it has to tell, but mostly plays out like a glorified DVD extra. "C"

The other four films in the shorts.TV theatrical presentation "Oscar Nominated Short Films 2016: Documentary" are… "Body Team 12" "Chau, beyond the Lines" "A Girl in the River: The Price of Forgiveness" "Last Day of Freedom"

We have posted our articles about each of those other films on their respective pages on this website.