The Last of the Unjust (N/C)

Directed by Claude Lanzmann

THE LAST of the Unjust is the name the main protagonist of this documentary gives himself.

One-time Viennese rabbi Benjamin Murmelstein was appointed by the nazis as an “elder,” a contact point between Hitler’s mass murderers and those who had been held captive in the Czech death camp Theresienstadt some 40 miles north of Prague.

He was the only one of such “post-holders” to survive the war.

In 1975, filmmaker Claude Lanzmann spent many hours interviewing him about his experiences during the war and afterwards. He had been incarcerated in the camp, designated by the nazis as a model ghetto.

Lanzmann pored over hours of interviews and footage to create a documentary that brings the terrible years there back to life.

It reveals how Murmelstein was impelled to negotiate with the nazis in an attempt to find a way of protecting those under his charge from being marched to the death camps. Yet he faced the awful dilemma that in doing so he was perhaps collaborating with the regime.

Murmelstein was arrested by the Czech authorities and accused by survivors of collaboration. Imprisoned for 18 months, he was acquitted and went to live in exile in Rome and the film shows him speaking frankly of the choices he faced, his apparent failures and successes.

The nazis promoted an image of inmates engaging in cultural activities in the camp, an attempt to try and hoodwink visitors from the Red Cross in 1944 that they were running a “normal” and relatively harmless operation.

But as the film shows, it was a “ghetto of deceit” created by Adolf Eichmann to try and dupe the world into thinking mass murder was not taking place. We are asked to consider whether Murmelstein was guilty of helping this happen.

A moving and thought-provoking film.

Dan Blaster

Erebus: Into the Unknown (12A)

Directed by Charlotte Purdy

GIVEN the exorbitant cost of cinema-going these days, why would you want to pay to see a made-for-television documentary?

It’s simple. The cinema screen gives a different charge to this extraordinary true story of New Zealand policemen tasked with recovering bodies after an Air New Zealand jet and its 257 passengers crashed into Mount Erebus in Antarctica.

The heroic efforts of men with little or no training, surviving in the freezing and storm-ridden Antarctic while rummaging among body parts to identify victims, makes for scary viewing.

The psychological and physical horrors are summed up by one policeman, who says: “We had limited equipment, just simple polar tents and we froze at nighttime. We never changed our clothes, we ate our food with the same woollen gloves we used all day picking up bodies.”

An already stark story gains even more power with the emergence of a possible official cover-up of the cause of the crash.

If only all made-for-TV documentaries were as thought-provoking — it hits as almost as hard as a crash-landing.

Ethan Carter

Foxcatcher (15)

Directed by Bennett Miller

“BASED on a true story” all too often means only the facts have been changed to make for better box-office.

Even so, it’s possible that this strange story about the weird relationship between a US multimillionaire and two professional wrestlers may be true.

That said, it has a commendable moral — even in the US, millions may not be enough to save a murderer from jail.

Foxcatcher tells the story of multimillionaire sponsor John du Pont, who woos washed-out former Olympic gold medallist wrestler Mark Schultz (Channing Tatum) to train his team Foxcatcher for the 1988 Seoul Olympics.

Schultz lives in style in a luxury chalet on du Pont’s Pennsylvania estate and at first the millionaire — “Don’t call me Mister du Pont, I consider you a friend” — and employee bond.

But then everything goes pear-shaped and eventually ends in murder after the former hires Schultz’s older brother Dave (Mark Ruffalo) to join the Foxcatcher team.

Steve Carrell, whose huge fake nose is almost as fascinating as his performance, is an unrecognisable weirdo and Schultz is well cast, in contrast with the bland performance from Ruffalo.

Bennett’s direction is efficient enough to keep you watching but little more.

Ethan Carter

Into the Woods (PG)

Directed by Rob Marshall

DISNEY embraces its dark side in this captivating film adaptation of the stage musical Into the Woods which explores what happens following the happy-ever-after endings in fairy tales.

The transition from stage to screen of the landmark show by Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine is seamless in the skilled hands of director Rob Marshall.

It combines a number of well-loved fairy tales and gives them a modern twist while retaining the darker and violent elements of the Brothers Grimm stories.

The stellar cast, headed by Meryl Streep as a formidable witch, do justice to Sondheim’s powerful and poignant songs. Anna Kendrick (Cinderella) and Emily Blunt as the baker’s wife are particularly impressive, though Johnny Depp is wasted as the Wolf.

It’s a fun yet cautionary tale of greed, ambition, loss and being careful of what you wish for.

Maria Duarte