Defiant Requiem
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Defiant Requiem illuminates the extraordinary, untold story of the brave acts of resistance by Jewish prisoners at the Terezín concentration camp during World War II. Follow the remarkable story of Rafael Schächter, a brilliant young Czech opera-choral conductor who was arrested and sent to Terezín in 1941. His most extraordinary act was recruiting 150 prisoners and teaching them the Verdi Requiem by rote in a dank cellar using a smuggled score, after endless days of exhausting forced labour. The Requiem was performed on sixteen occasions for fellow prisoners. The last, most infamous performance occurred on June 23, 1944. With only sixty prisoner-singers remaining following massive deportations, Schächter was ordered by the Nazi camp commander to perform the Requiem before high-ranking SS officers from Berlin and the International Red Cross to support the charade that the prisoners were well treated and flourishing. Defiant Requiem shows how incredible courage, hope and, above all, an unyielding will to survive sparked an entirely unique method of fighting Nazi oppression, enabling the prisoners to maintain their dignity and humanity while battling the worst of mankind with the best. The Nazi legacy of brutality is well established, but the Terezín legacy is virtually unknown, and is told dramatically in Defiant Requiem.
Cast
Bebe Neuwirth, Lindsay Hopper, Kelly Tighe
Director(s)
Doug Shultz
Duration
1 x 85'
Genre(s)
Film, Feature Documentary, War, Historical
Year of Production
2012