Review by Choice Review
In this work of prodigious scholarship, Gershenson (Judaic and Near Eastern studies, Univ. of Massachusetts) makes an important contribution to the depiction of the Holocaust in the Soviet Union. She notes that Soviet films about WW II universalized the war, and included Jews as one group among many killed by the Nazis. Through archival research, viewing Soviet films of the time, and interviews, the author has uncovered a number of scripts that sought to document the Nazi war against the Jews, only to be rejected by the Soviet film censor. Gershenson refers to these unfilmed scripts as the "phantom Holocaust cinema." When films about the Holocaust did pass the censors, they were often edited to exclude Jews--what Gershenson calls "the Holocaust without Jews." She concludes that the Holocaust never assumed a central position in film narrative, and when the trope of Jewish suffering was included, it was introduced as a background "to tell someone else's story: the entirety of the Soviet people, or more specifically, Russian fighters, Ukrainian workers, Belarus partisans." Paradoxically, compared to those in the West, Soviet films were among the first to expose Nazi anti-Semitism, and the first to depict a mass execution of Jews in a major film. Summing Up: Highly recommended. All academic levels/libraries. J. Fischel emeritus, Messiah College
Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by Choice Review
