_Schindler's List_ opened here last night in English with German
subtitles.  A reporter attempting to interview people coming out of one
theater was met with choked-up "no comments" or expressions of disbelief
(careful: not "disbelief" as in "I don't believe it happened," but rather
"I can't/don't want to believe it happened like that.")  My German friend
watching the news with me shakes her head.  "Why do they act so
surprised?" she wants to know.  Indeed, this certainly would have been
their first encounter with the holocaust.  Is there something about the
"Spielberg touch" that can make an experience of this history seem new to
a German audience?
PS: Today's newspaper carries a photo of Spielberg and his wife at
Auschwitz.  Mr. Jurassic Camp is sporting the ever-appropriate baseball
cap (I can't see if it says "Schindler's List" on the bill).
"No comment."
 
Cary Nathenson
Freie Universitaet Berlin
Washington University in St. Louis
 
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