Schindler's List Movie

Schindler's List movie will be available on DVD for the first on March 9, 2004 from Universal Home Video & DVD. Preorder your Schindler's List movie DVD and visit the Official Schindler's List web site to learn more.

Inspiration for Schindler's List Movie

Steven Spielberg was originally attracted to the Schindler's List movie in 1982 when Thomas Keneally's book, Schindler's Ark, was published to critical acclaim. What drew Spielberg to the novel was its emphasis on the experiences of individual people, which help anchor the reader emotionally within the overwhelming events of the Holocaust.

"I had a hunger to make the Schindler's List movie a few months after E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial opened. I wanted to document it for the public record," Spielberg said. But timing and script obstacles precluded the film from being made until 1993. The delay, believed Steven Spielberg, was fortuitous: "It took me ten years of emotional development in order to say, 'Now I'm ready to make Schindler's List.'"

One of the most ambitious productions ever to be filmed in Poland, principal photography began on the Schindler's List movie in Krakow on March 1, 1993. It was completed 72 days later, four days ahead of schedule. The predominantly Polish crew was complemented by workers from England, Croatia, Austria, Germany, Canada, Israel and the United States, including many Polish-Americans.

Realism in The Schindler's List Movie

The Schindler's List movie was filmed entirely in black and white. Spielberg explained, "Virtually everything I've seen on the Holocaust is in black and white, so my vision of the Holocaust is what I've seen in documentaries and in books, which have largely been stark black and white images."

To further enhance the realism of the Schindler's List movie, Kaminski explained that "forty percent of the film was shot using hand-held cameras." The black and white and hand-held camera gives the Schindler's List movie sort of a cinema verite, documentary feel. It embodied the truth we were trying to explore and communicate what happened. It made it seem more real, somehow."

Spielberg hopes the Schindler's List movie will renew public awareness about the Holocaust and help encourage audiences to explore its legacy in modern society. "No one can do anything to fix the past-that's already happened," said Spielberg. "But a picture like this can impact us, delivering a mandate about what must never happen again."

Buy Schindler's List

Learn more about the Schindler's List movie when you visit the Schindler's List DVD web site. The web site is a great historical resource with movie clips and trailers, cast and crew bios, information on the film's inspiration, links to educational organizations, Holocaust survivors stories and information on the new Schindler's List DVD.