My Knees Were Jumping: Remembering The
Kindertransports
Picture:
B- Sound: C+ Extras: C+ Film: B
Documentaries
on The Holocaust are usually very painful to watch, and though My Knees Were Jumping: Remembering The
Kindertransports (1995) is an excellent film that joins that weaving of
this epic historical moment, there is a quiet sense of triumph over the Nazis
even over all of this ugly, unspeakable pain.
In this case, it has to do with the “opportunities” a small group of
children had to get to England when the rest of Europe turned their backs on German
Jews. The other countries did not want
to get involved, or were explicitly supporting Hitler and the rest of the Axis
of Evil. Why The Nazis allowed any
Jewish children leave Germany or Austria when The Final Solution was at
hand is odd, but since they planned to invade and own countries like England, perhaps they thought this was
temporary.
Unlike
adult victims who are scared for life by the pain directly, these now-grown
adults offer a new perspective in how they were also scarred for life, losing
their parents under the worst possible circumstances. The distance gives them a triumph the Nazis
could have never imagined, despite being 100%, full-fledged victims, refugees,
and nomads upon arrival in the United Kingdom.
They tell their stories and experiences to the best of their ability,
but give us a priceless new piece (not heard enough, if ever, before) of the
puzzle of what really happened. This
includes Canada and The United States turning
down these helpless children.
Director
Melissa Hacker begins with her own mother and then moves on to what seems to be
a few dozen others, all with amazing stories of survival and serious adjustment
disorder, compounded by the nightmares. It
should also be said that this kind of thing happens every day all over to world
to its children and the most powerful countries of the world do little about
it. That is wrong. I only hope people who watch are not
complacent or naïve to think this was some one-time thing. It is only because those very powers were
threatened that something good happened.
Just note how all the nations but one did not do anything then!
The full
screen image was filmed, most likely on 16mm stock and looks good. That extends to the stills and stock footage,
which retain their film-like look and feel, even with the usual
variedness. We do not see this enough
today, with all the video. The Dolby
Digital 2.0 Stereo is good, though does not really have surrounds, it still is
pretty good for this type of 2.0. Joanne
Woodward narrates. The few extras
include the usual Docurama titles gallery with a few of the titles offering
trailers and brief text on Hacker.
This by
no means negates what Schindler or Wallenberg pulled off in helping Jews, while
finding placement in England was far from easy. This was still often very tough, but a far
better fate than death in a concentration camp, the epitome of the lesser of
two evils. Seeing them having quicker
access to the nightmare and it being a point of view that no one else could be
privileged to is enlightening in a way that the pack of formulaic lies “the
revisionists” (those who think The Holocaust was a fraud, or actually want
others to believe that; Fascists, Neo-Nazis, Aryans, and other such idiots)
keep peddling. The hate assumes this did
not happen and this story, this truth, adds a vital dimension to the full
record of what almost became the world’s permanent, endless nightmare. Though not painless, My Knees Were Jumping: Remembering The Kindertransports completes
the picture of the least heard-of Holocaust survivors of all.
- Nicholas Sheffo
