Movies - TV
The Schindler’s List Mystery Even Steven Spielberg Could Never Solve
By JEREMY SMITH
When making "Schindler's List," Steven Spielberg didn't ask why good people did nothing; he wondered why one man risked his life to spare the lives of his Jewish employees.
For Spielberg, it was the major dramatic question that drove the film's narrative, and, while discussing the movie several decades later, one he hadn’t answerd to his satisfaction.
Spielberg told The Hollywood Reporter that he struggled with his adaptation of Thomas Keneally's book (originally titled "Schindler's Ark").
"The great mystery, though, which I could never solve when I read it, was: Why did Schindler do this?” Spielberg said. He wondered why Schindler would risk his fortune as well.
“Why did he [...] buy his workers back from [Kraków-Płaszów concentration camp commandant] Amon Göth and eventually bring them to freedom?" Spielberg pondered.
He added, "Every time I look at my Rosebud sled hanging on the wall, I think, 'I never had the Rosebud moment for 'Schindler's List' that Orson Welles found for 'Citizen Kane.”"