March 18, 2004 | Read Time: 2 minutes
The DVD of Schindler’s List, which hit stores this week, includes more than the typical director’s commentary and cast biographies: It also features a 77-minute documentary produced by Steven Spielberg’s charity, Survivors of the Shoah Visual History Foundation.
The documentary, Voices From the List, features interviews with men and women who were included on Oskar Schindler’s list in real life and who recount their stories of the Holocaust.
Another, shorter piece on the movie DVD tells the story of the Shoah Foundation, which Mr. Spielberg started 10 years ago — just after filming the Academy Award-winning movie — to record, index, and disseminate testimonies from Holocaust survivors and witnesses. Today, the foundation has almost 120,000 hours of video in its archives.
Douglas Greenberg, president of the Shoah Foundation, hopes the bonus materials on the DVD will bring public recognition. “We hope to let people know what we’ve accomplished, and to give them some sense of what we do,” he says.
He adds that, while Mr. Spielberg is a “very generous donor,” 70 percent of the foundation’s funds come from sources other than the director, and the DVD promotion provides a tool to educate potential donors. The DVD comes with an envelope addressed to the foundation, in the hopes that it will encourage viewers to make donations.
The charity has also updated its Internet offerings, adding new features to coincide with the group’s anniversary. Beginning this year, Shoah is making available video vignettes via a new Web site, http://www.vhf.org. The vignettes include excerpts from the survivor and witness testimonies.
Also added: online exhibits, materials for teachers and students, and an ability to search the group’s archives. Among the exhibits is “Voices of the Holocaust: Children Speak,” an interactive project designed for middle-school students. The exhibit highlights testimonies from four survivors who were children during the Holocaust, and includes supplemental materials, such as maps and a glossary.
Additionally, the foundation has received funds from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the National Science Foundation, and the federal Institute of Museum and Library Services to deliver digitized testimonies via Internet2, a secure fiber-optic network connected to 350 academic institutions.
For more information: Go to http://www.schindlerslist.com or http://www.vhf.org.
