Word: lanzmann
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...Lanzmann's genius--and the source of the film's power--is his ability to gauge exactly what he wants and can get from each interview. He is by turns gentle, coaxing, disbelieving, and confrontational with those he interviews. It is as though he can. feel exactly to what degree each subject is willing to recount experiences, and just what his limits are. And he knows precisely how far he can push each interview, each subject, to get what he wants. While he will take 20 minutes to coax a group of villagers to describe what life was like with...
...Lanzmann, at times, is incredibly subtle. Without condescension or harassment, usually patient, he is always on just the right wavelength for the individual conversation. The results can be endearing, terrifying and just astonishing...
...Lanzmann interviews a group of Polish villagers, through an interpreter...
...Lanzmann makes no attempt to indoctrinate or to educate; he wantsonly to encourage each story in ultra-realistic detail, to bring out the unimaginable on the faces and in the words of his subjects. In particular the Czech Jew Filip Muller, who survived Auschwitz as a member of the "special detail" assigned to clearing out the gas chambers after each use, is remarkably lucid and eloquent. White-haired, handsome and soft-spoken, Muller tells how the victims scrambled once the gas was turned on, what he encountered when it was turned off. His are some of the longest and most...
While Muller needs no prompting, others do. Sometimes, in fact, Lanzmann can't help but get involved, confrontational. It would be impossible not to. When his subjects recall less than Lanzmann knows they could, he prods them. He's done his homework. Armed with statistics and documents, he challenges Nazi officials with the facts (see box). He will not settle for less...