SCHINDLER LIST

Schindler List is a movie that is more than just a story of a man and his heroic deed, but also to show today’s world on the dangers of hatred. It has been emphasizes in the movie as in how cruelly the Nazis treated the Jews. It has been also pin point on how one man can make a difference as is the case with Oskar Schindler. However, perhaps the main objective of Schindler List is that the world should never forget Oskar Schindler and what he did for the Jews as well as for mankind.  Schindler’s impact is so great that even the numerical facts are astonishing. In fact if one compares the number of direct descendants of the Schindlerjuden to the number of Jews alive in Poland after 1945, it is evident that there are more Schindlerjuden today than the total number of Jews in 1945 Poland.

One psychological event that took place in this movie had to go through dangerous ease of denial. The Jews in Schindler’s List, as they are forced into the ghetto and later into the labour camp, suffer from a denial of their true situation. The denial afflicted many European Jews who fell victim to the Holocaust. They leave their homes in the countryside and move to the ghetto because the Nazis force them to. Once in the ghetto, however, they believe the bad times will pass. Their denial of their situation continues in the labour camp, even as killing surrounds them.

Schindler’s List will definitely give everyone a personal effect, well mind in fact it does affect me personally. What seems to be interesting in Schindler’s List is the question of morality. It will make one to question himself, would I be as heroic as Oskar Schindler if I were in his shoes? This movie had given all the opportunity to look at ourselves and analyze what's inside. 

Oskar Schindler:  They won't soon forget the name "Oskar Schindler" around here. "Oskar Schindler," they'll say, "everybody remembers him. He did something extraordinary. He did what no one else did. He came with nothing, a suitcase, and built a bankrupt company into a major manufactory. And left with a steamer trunk, two steamer trunks, of money. All the riches of the world." 

GANDHI

“To deprive a man of his natural liberty and to deny to him the ordinary amenities of life is worse than starving the body; it is starvation of the soul, the dweller in the body,” this quote is an example of how Gandhi firmly believed in freedom and equality for people. Gandhi believed his main obstacle in life was to end discrimination towards every one.

South Africa was one stage in Gandhi’s life in which he tried to end racial persecution. Being thrown off a train when he sat in the first-class section was the first time that Gandhi experienced racial persecution here. After his realization that the Europeans in South Africa did not want Indians to be in a high status position, Gandhi tried to oppose them. he did this by burning his “pass” that was issued only to the non-Europeans. Other Indians immediately followed him even though it was against the law. This event was the first of many times that Gandhi used passive resistance to illustrate a point. He set up meetings for Indians to gather and protest non-violently. Even in his young years, Gandhi believed that all people should be treated the same and learn to love each other. “In nature there is fundamental unity running through all the diversity we see about us.”

Gandhi lived in South Africa for about twenty-two years, but when the oppressive laws were changed, he made his way back to his home country, India. It had been a long time since he had lived in India and upon arrival he dressed as a commoner and was greeted by thousands of people. Gandhi immediately became a part of Indian politics and his opinion had a great effect on most of the country. Gandhi tried to include the poverty-stricken people in classifying India. He realized their needs and made efforts to help them financially. Gandhi reached out to the inferior castes and began his fight to end discrimination and British control of India. Gandhi once said, “just as a man would not cherish living in a body other than his own, so do nations not like to live under other nations, however noble and great the latter may be.” Passive resistance is still Gandhi’s approach to gaining freedom from the British and stopping violence in India but discrimination keeps getting in the way. Judging people by their religion or colour of skin leads to violence and oppression which are problems in India. Gandhi gets put in prison many times in his lifetimes because of his push for Indian independence. Muslim-Hindu hostility was ended shortly when Gandhi tried to unite the two religious groups by fasting until they stopped the violence against each other and the British. He wanted the British to end their rule on India, and for the Muslims and Hindus to cooperate with each other in the independence of India. India was granted its independence on August 15, 1947.

Although Gandhi was a man of faith, he did not found a church, nor did he create and specific dogma for his followers. Gandhi believed in the unity of all mankind under one god, and preached Hindu, Muslim and Christian ethics. As a youth, he was neither a genius nor a child prodigy. Indeed, he suffered from extreme shyness. However, he approached life as a very long series of small steps towards his goals, which he pursued relentlessly. By the time he died, India had become an independent country, free of British rule, in fact, the largest democracy in the world, mostly Hindu with sizable Muslim minority. Today, Gandhi is remembered not only as a political leader, but as a moralist who appealed to the universal conscience of mankind. As such, he changed the world.

DEPARTURES

Departures is a movie with a personal touch that may evoke many sort of emotions among those who had the chance to watch it. Recently, the movie has won an Oscar for best foreign language film which makes it extra special. The movie is about Daigo Kobayashi (Masahiro Motoki), who is a devoted cellist in an orchestra that has just been dissolved due to bankruptcy and now finds himself without a job. Daigo decides to move back to his old hometown with his wife to look for a new job and to start over. He answers a classified ad entitled “Departures” thinking the advertisement is about travel agency, only to discover that the job is actually for “Nokanshi” or “encoffineer”, a funeral professional who prepares deceased bodies for burial and entry into the next life. While his wife and others despise the job, Daigo takes a certain pride in his job and begins to perfect the art of “Nokanshi”, acting as a gentle gatekeeper between life and death, between the departed and the family of the departed. The film follows his profound and sometimes comical journey with death as he uncovers the wonder, joy and meaning of life and living.

Death is one of the greatest mysteries of life. Its inescapability has been a source of wonder, fear, hopefulness, and puzzlement throughout history. Humans, being the only species consciously aware of the inevitability of death, have sought from time immemorial to cope with this unique insight. In traditional context, death was conspicuously visible throughout society and people went to great lengths to remind themselves of how fragile life is. Reminders of mortality were everywhere, whether they are in literature, paintings, oral traditions or the cemeteries and churches where the physical remains of the deaths intersected with the daily activities of the community.

In the current modern century, the social and psychological landscape was transformed, redefining the culture, social and personal experiences of death. As individualism, secularism, materialism, and technology have become driving forces for the current modern generation, as the experience of dying and its meanings have been dramatically recast. Individualism replaces community in daily life, community presence and support is withdrawn from the dying and grieving processes. Secularism as a way of life offers many opportunities and great pleasures, but is ultimately unable to offer meaning and comfort at the end of life. Like secularism, materialism poorly equips individuals and societies to grapple with the mystery of death. In addition, technological achievement and dependence have enabled humanity to actively fight against death, thus forestalling death for countless numbers of individuals.