Children of the Holocaust

went to see Secret Lives: Hidden Children & Their Rescuers During World War II at the Angelika - Dallas last night. It's a 79-minute documentary and was good, but not life-changing. I did like the fact that it presented a viewpoint seldom heard: that of the small part of the (occupied-territories) population which successfully hid Jewish children during Adolf Hitler's campaign of extermination (1938-1945).

No matter how young, these children were dealt a permanent mark from the ordeal; many of the rescuers became more real as parents than their own, for a variety of reasons. Many of the birth parents were sent to the Nazi concentration camps, never to return. The vast majority of Jews were duped into believing they were being sent to forced labor camps, and not crematoria, which is why 90% of the Jewish children were killed.

I've been to several Holocaust-related films in the past year, nearly all close quickly at the box office (a notable exception being The Pianist, by Roman Polanski). One movie (Amen) examined the Catholic Church's non-intervention, and was mostly panned by the Church (probably adding to its credibility).