History Film Series

15 April 2015, The Quarrel (1991), 7:00 Constant 1005 (in collaboration with the Jewish Education Initiative)

Eli Cohen, Saul Rubinek and R. H. Thomson explore the story of two ex-friends and Holocaust survivors, one a rabbi and the other who lives secularly and doubts the existence of God, who meet in a park and continue their "quarrel" that began before the war and continues with reflection on the Holocaust. (Rabbi Michael Panitz of Temple Israel in Norfolk and Professor Finley-Croswhite).

27 March 2014, Au Revoir Les Enfants (1987), 7:10 p.m, OCNPS 200

Louis Malle explores the problems of French collaboration and resistance in this return to his own boyhood in German-occupied France in the winter of 1944. (Professor Finley-Croswhite).

28 January 2014, The Riddle of the Sands (1979), 7:20 p.m., BAL 1012

Based on a spy novel by Erskine Childers, The Riddle of the Sands is set in 1901 and uses a maritime adventure to explore British-German relations before WWI. (Professor Ingo Heidbrink).

8 December 2013, Harvest of Shame by Edward R. Murrow, 6:00 p.m., MGB 102

Harvest of Shame is a 1960 television documentary by Edward R. Murrow about American migrant agricultural workers. (Professor John Weber, co-sponsored with ODU Learning Communities).

4 October 2013, Dismal Swamp, 7:00 p.m., BAL 1012

This documentary film by ODU Department of English Professor Imtiaz Habib and ODU student Richard Green explores stories of runaway servants and slaves from the Great Dismal Swamp of Virginia. (Professor Maura Hametz, co-sponsored with ODU Learning Communities).

19 February 2013, Come and See, 7:00 p.m., BAL 2066

Come and See, directed by Elem Klimov (1985), shows the experience of a sixteen-year-old boy who turns to the woods and joins the partisans in opposition to the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union during the Second World War. (Professor Jersild).

9 November 2012, Fateless, 5:30 p.m., Constant 1002

Fateless premiered in 2005 and was directed by Lajos Koltai based on a book and screenplay by Imre Kertesz. Fateless confronts us with the Holocaust in Hungary by telling the story of a teenaged boy, Gyuri, who ends up in Auschwitz but is unable to adjust to his return to Budapest after the liberation. The film won numerous awards when it opened and received excellent reviews. Peter Bradshaw from The Guardian notes, "Fateless asks questions of what survival means, whether it confers not merely guilt but also existential bewilderment, a sense of being historically undead: a living, breathing anomaly. Gyuri is a witness to something whose horror consists in universal destruction, and he is feeling the burden of bearing witness as Koltai shows that Holocaust-denial or at least skepticism is already well underway. Is the survivor entitled to ordinary human happiness - or is this human emotion an act of disloyalty and diminution? These questions are a vital part of this outstanding film's dark and sombre power." (Professor Finley-Croswhite).

10 April 2012, Titanic, 7:20 p.m., BAL 1012 (on the occasion of the 100 year anniversary of the loss of RMS TITANIC)

Titanic, directed by Herbert Selpin, is a 1943 German Nazi propaganda movie produced by Tobis Film for UFA. The movie uses the story of the loss of RMS TITANIC for a Nazi take on British capitalism and how fictional scrupulous economic activities of shipping moguls finally caused the loss of RMS TITANIC. The movie was banned in Germany due to the scenes of mass panic and only screened for Nazi military audiences in occupied Europe. Only in 2005 the movie was restored and the complete and uncensored version shown. (Professor Heidbrink).