GOD ON TRIAL
UK, 2008, 90 minutes, Colour.
Rupert Graves, Stellan Skarsgaard, Stephen Dillane, Eddie Marsan, Jack Sheppard, Dominic Cooper, Anthony Sher, Blake Ridson, Ashleigh Artus, David de Keyser.
Directed by Andy De Emmony.
God on Trial was made for television. It is based on a story about a group of Auschwitz men putting God on trial before their execution. The film was written by a Catholic, Frank Cottrell Boyce (many of the films of Michael Winterbottom like The Claim, Tristram Shandy, Welcome to Sarajevo and other films like Millions). It was directed by Andy De Emmony (many comic television programs as well as Fantabulosa, the story of Kenneth Williams and Filth: The Mary Whitehouse Story). After God on Trial, writer and director collaborated on the television movie, Framed.
The film is strong on dialogue, offering a range of arguments about the existence of God, the providence of God, the benevolence or cruelty of God in the light of the history of the Jewish people, biblical texts and rabbinic traditions as well as secular arguments. The cast is very strong and each member of the cast is able to put forward dramatic presentations of particular points of view.
Jack Sheppard as an older Jew and Eddie Marsan as the father of three children who were killed by the Nazis stand out amongst an excellent cast.
The framework for the film has a group of tourists visiting Auschwitz and moving then to flashbacks – with a moving finale where the men in the gas chamber mingle with the tourists who are visiting. The message of God on Trial, of the Holocaust, and questions about God’s providence are relevant at all ages.
1.The impact of the film, for a Jewish audience, for those who had relatives in the concentration camps? Non-Jews? The film written by a Catholic author?
2.The Auschwitz locations, the exteriors? The huts? The muted colour and tone? The musical score?
3.The tourists, their guide, payment to go in, the explanations of the camp and the behaviour? The insertion of the trial scenes?
4.The title and the case, a rabbinical case, needing three judges, the live Torah (and the rabbi being the Torah alive in their midst)? The charge of murder and collaboration?
5.The arguments for and against, intellectual, emotional, religious and secular, biblical, scientific, common sense, faith and tradition? Prayer?
6.The group, the arrest, the range of men, the line-up and the humiliation, the doctor and the decisions? In the hut? Facing death?
7.The new group arriving from Poland, the inmates’ reactions? Unsympathetic, sympathetic? Their range of backgrounds? Their stories, suffering, massacres?
8.The characters and their arguments, dramatically presented, intercutting, developing?
9.The lawyer: presiding, his control of the proceedings, speeches, his discussion about punishment, good men being punished and not Hitler? Asking was the Holocaust a punishment in proportion to crime? Should God be guilty because the survival of his people was not certain? His final speech, the explanation of his family, Jewish father and his death, mother, changing the name, his marriage, an ardent German, his children in the Hitler Youth? A Jew-hating German? No knowledge of the Torah? The question about Auschwitz and chaos and dirt, German deliberate organisation to prove to the Germans that their prejudices about Jews as dirty and disorganised was correct? The Germans taking everything from the Jews? His plea that they not let them take their God, their covenant (even if he didn’t exist)?
10.Schmidt, religious and devout, theological arguments, from the Scriptures, the dignity of suffering? The creation of a new world and Jews and Torah surviving? His intellectual arguments? The example of Abraham and Jacob arguing and struggling with God? His image of God as a surgeon, violence to purify people no a punishment, the flood and Babylon and the diaspora leading to good? A remnant with some great good? A sacrifice and Holocaust of the best? His emphasis on a new Israel? The issue of the all-powerful and just God and the nature of free will?
11.Mordechai: his accusation against God, a breach of contract of the covenant? Quoting the pledges of Exodus 19 and Psalm 81? Quoting the psalms about God destroying his enemies? His relationship with his father, commenting on his father’s blaming him for his secular life?
12.The father: old, in the line-up, his reaction to his son, his being prepared to die? Faith, prayer, respect for the Torah? His experiences, the emotional argument? His inability to believe that God wanted the Jews to be destroyed? His being upset about the denial of God, his son, his secular marriage, the lives of scientists and secularists? His emotional appeal? His love for his son at the end, the list?
13.Idek: the scholar, his learned arguments and explanations, his having to face the reality of the concentration camp? His explaining the martyrs in Jewish history, Masada? Asking where the Romans are now and where Torah is? Suffering as a privilege, part of God’s plan? That Hitler would die, the war would end, that Torah would live and therefore there should be a trust in God?
14.Lieble, Moche urging him to come forward? His silence, the story of his family, the massacre in the village? His three sons, the choice for one of them to live and the others to die? The issue of choice, his bewilderment about free will, his comments about feeling the presence of God? The fig tree and the wasps and the scientist’s argument, his talking about wasps and pollinating and bringing new life? Reflecting on his story, his not wanting free will, wanting his sons? The Nazi officer had a choice but he did not? His final affirmation of faith? His quoting the Scriptures, everyone putting on their caps?
15.Moche, young, angry, God an evil bastard? If he’s guilty, what? His taunts, young and brash? His interventions, wanting Lieble to come forward? His ultimate fear as he had to face death even though he was young?
16.Ezra, the appeal to him for his reflections, his being a glove-maker, a simple man, not understanding, not being able to give answers?
17.The Capo, his attitude towards the others? The criminal, his boast about having brains, wanting to live and survive? Staying alive till the end of the war, therefore pleasing the SS, therefore keeping the Jews in order? When more Jews came to the camp he thanked God and boasted that God did not strike him down?
18.The scientist, appealing to the number of stars, whether God made them or not? God’s attention on the small planet, on the Jews? The point of having a covenant only for faithful Jews? His argument that there was always another group, expanding the understanding of God, therefore the use of conquering and power, someone with a better idea of God – and Hitler finally saying that there was one God and it was him? His argument from the self-eating insects – and Lieble’s response for the creativity of other insects?
19.Akiba: his being silent, standing and his long speech, his appeal to the history of Israel, the reason for being in Egypt and coming out, the history of the plagues, the cruelty of the death of the firstborn, the drowning of the Egyptians in the Red Sea, Israel’s destruction of the Canaanites, the language of no mercy, Saul and Samuel and the slaughter of the king, the Amalekites and the Moabites? David and his slaughter? Those slaughters were the Moabites’ Auschwitz? Saying that our God is not good, only on our side? His stating that the Jews should have stood up to God, God was not good, only strong? That the SS had their motto, “God with us”?
20.The interruption by the doctor, examining the men, calling out the numbers, the emotional effect as numbers were called out?
21.The summing up? The men wanting to hear the conclusion: the comment that the trial and discussion was a kind of prayer? That people cannot know the mind of God, that God is too great, prayer and faith are important, the war will end? But the verdict that God was guilty of a breach of contract?
22.The men being taken out, put into the gas chamber, stripped, under the shower? The group in solidarity? The tourists, the scene where they intermingled with the victims, everyone in the gas chamber together?
