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6 months ago
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EXCLUSIVE: Abramorama has acquired North American rights to Resistance – They Fought Back, a documentary spotlighting Jewish resistance during WWII, from News & Documentary Emmy winners Paula S. Apsell and Kirk Wolfinger.
Featuring narration from actors Corey Stoll, Dianna Agron, and Maggie Siff, among others, the film is set for a weeklong New York run at the Firehouse: DCTV’s Cinema for Documentary Film beginning April 12, and will open in Los Angeles and additional cities nationwide thereafter. View a trailer above.
Resistance is described as a passionate refutation of one of society’s misunderstandings of the Holocaust, one which holds that Jews went to their deaths passively, “as sheep to the slaughter.” The film instead focuses on Jewish communities and individuals throughout Eastern Europe who bravely rose up in resistance against the all-powerful Nazi war machine.
There were uprisings in ghettos large and small, rebellions in death camps, and thousands of Jews fought Nazis in the forests. Additionally, across Eastern Europe, Jews waged campaigns of non-violent resistance, standing up against Nazi brutality by feeding the hungry, caring for orphans, recording German war crimes, and maintaining a high level of cultural activities and spiritual observance.
“As I would learn, many stories of Jewish resistance have all but vanished. In some cases, no historical records exist, and no one survived to tell the tale,” stated co-director Apsell. “The Germans documented many aspects of their war against the Jews, but they were allergic to any mention of Jewish resistance, leading many to think it never happened and to believe that ‘Jews went to their deaths like sheep to the slaughter.’ By documenting many examples of Jewish resistance in ghettos, forests and camps, Resistance – They Fought Back shows just how wrong that idea is.”
Co-director Wolfinger emphasized just how important verifying historical authenticity was in the making of the documentary, when it came to details big or small. “If you look at the film there are many instances where we went to places in Poland and Lithuania and we found the exact place that someone described where an example of Jewish resistance took place,” he shared. “And we had photographs and our director of photography, who happens to be my son, he and I would just search for that building, that curb that we know it is in the picture and we’d try to find it. Because we wanted to be able to say with one hundred percent accuracy that this place existed.”
Abramorama’s CEO, Karol Martesko-Fenster, praised the filmmakers for crafting “an illuminating documentary that captures untold stories of both unarmed resistance and armed revolt, giving voice to the men and many women who risked their lives on a daily basis. The film serves as a wakeup call and reminder of the importance of moral courage during dark and difficult times.”
The winner of awards at the 2023 Santa Barbara Film Festival and elsewhere, Resistance – They Fought Back was produced by Owen Palmquist and Lisa C. Goodfellow. Executive producers included Apsell, Professor Michael Berenbaum, Michael J. Bohnen, Ori & Mirit Eisen, Professor Richard A. Freund, and Richard A. Salomon.
