A grandmother tells her granddaughter a story, as many grandmothers do. But the story Sara Atzmon tells her granddaughter is an extraordinarily different story. One of an unending journey across half of Europe. Stopping at places with strange names such as Auschwitz, Bergen-Belsen, Buchenwald. A ride in cattlecars full of people who were starving, freezing and had no toilet. A story of children who were playing in a concentration camp next to dead bodies and betting on who would die of starvation the next morning.

 

When the Jewish Sara Atzmon was a child herself, the Nazis chased her and her family through half of Europe. The film accompanies the now 79-year old Israeli woman to all those places in Hungary, Austria and Germany again where the Nazis once tortured her and killed her father and three of her brothers and sisters.

 

And the filmmakers go back with Sara Atzmon to where she was born again at age 12 - to Israel. Sara landed there in 1945 with the first ship from Europe to Haifa, Palestine.

 

Nevertheless, the filmmakers do not "only" tell a Holocaust biography. By Sara Atzmon telling her 12-year old granddaughter about her fate, she draws a parallel to the young people of today, especially those in Germany. It shows you how important the struggle not to forget is. "I do not assign blame, I want them to take responsibility," says the well-known Israeli artist Sara Aztmon, who goes to school classes in Celle and Mundelsheim on the difficult journey into the past and present. "The knowledge of the barbarism of the Nazis creates a sense that makes the injustice, racial discrimination and oppression of today visible," said Sara Atzmon.

 

Why this movie now?

Because Ausschwitz is forgotten.

A Forsa poll and an expert study commissioned by the Bundestag show that

 

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The film deals with the such widespread opinions as:

 

"It's finally time to stop talking about the Holocaust."

"The Jews have gotten enough reparations."

"We've had enough of 'Holocaust'"

 

 

Sara Atzmon does not think so. Neither does her granddaughter

 

 

 

HOLOCAUST - out of mind?

A film by Ilona Rothin