December 19, 2024 • 46 mins
Listen to this profound episode of Conversations with Alan featuring Marc Bennett and Tim Roper, the producers and co-directors of the powerful documentary For the Living.
Marc and Tim take us on a journey through humanity’s most essential question: When will we truly say "NEVER AGAIN" and commit to ending the cycle of dehumanization?
For the Living tells the incredible story of Marcel Zielinski, a 10-year-old Holocaust survivor who, after escaping Auschwitz-Birkenau in 1945, walked 60 miles through a war zone in search of his surviving family. His journey was later honored by the Ride for the Living cycling event, where 250 cyclists traced Marcel’s path as a tribute to his resilience and a call to action for nurturing empathy and compassion.
Marc and Tim’s film urges us to reflect on how we can re-humanize in an era marked by dehumanization. How do we shift from memorializing the dead to reawakening compassion for the living?
Don’t miss this urgent conversation about resilience, remembrance, and the human spirit. Listen now and be part of this essential discussion.
Marc and Tim take us on a journey through humanity’s most essential question: When will we truly say "NEVER AGAIN" and commit to ending the cycle of dehumanization?
For the Living tells the incredible story of Marcel Zielinski, a 10-year-old Holocaust survivor who, after escaping Auschwitz-Birkenau in 1945, walked 60 miles through a war zone in search of his surviving family. His journey was later honored by the Ride for the Living cycling event, where 250 cyclists traced Marcel’s path as a tribute to his resilience and a call to action for nurturing empathy and compassion.
Marc and Tim’s film urges us to reflect on how we can re-humanize in an era marked by dehumanization. How do we shift from memorializing the dead to reawakening compassion for the living?
Don’t miss this urgent conversation about resilience, remembrance, and the human spirit. Listen now and be part of this essential discussion.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
[ Silence ]
(00:11):
>> Good evening, everybody.
Thank you for joining me for the Conversation
with Alan series.
I'm Alan Locker, and I'm the child
of two Holocaust survivors.
I created this series to have honest discussions
about the rise of anti-Semitism and hate,
with high hopes that it leads to conversations
that make us all think about our place in history,
and to inspire collective action to eradicate hate
(00:33):
in all its forms.
Conversations like this are more crucial now than ever
in the face of rising anti-Semitism worldwide.
Writer, director and producer Mark Bennett,
and his co-writer and director Tim Roper invite us
to explore humanity's most essential question.
When will we truly say never again and commit
(00:53):
to breaking the cycle of dehumanization?
At the heart of their powerful new documentary
for the living is the harrowing story of Marcel Zalinski,
a 10-year-old Holocaust survivor who after spending two years
in a death camp is liberated by incoming Russian forces
from Auschwitz-Birkenau in January of 1945.
Marcel then embarked on a 60-mile journey by foot
(01:16):
through Warzone in search of his surviving family.
Decades later, Marcel's journey was honored by RIDE
for the living in an international cycling event
where 250 cyclists from around the world
traced Marcel's liberation path.
This powerful tribute serves as both a historical commemoration
and a modern call to action urging us to nurture empathy and compassion.
(01:40):
With their film, Mark and Tim ask us to reflect,
how do we dehumanize in an error marred by dehumanization?
How do we shift from merely memorializing the dead
to reawakening compassion for the living?
Please help me welcome to the locker room and conversations
with Alan, Tim Roper and Mark Bennett.
Hello, gentlemen.
(02:04):
Thank you so much for being here.
Hi, thanks for having us.
The documentary, as I told you backstage,
it is incredibly powerful, educational,
and truly so incredibly timely.
I'd love to learn how you first learned about the ride
(02:24):
for the living.
Well, our executive producer, Melinda Goldrich,
is a cyclist and a daughter of a Holocaust survivor.
And she became aware of this event in Poland,
created and hosted by the Crackout JCC.
(02:45):
And she was fascinated by it in its uniqueness
to think about a bike ride commemorating the Holocaust
and raising money for the Holocaust survivors
that they take care of at the JCC.
And she was so intrigued with it that we started to look
into possibly doing a film to explain this
(03:06):
and showcase this amazing event.
And that's how we became interested in it.
And I think Tim and I's curiosity was both peaked
by the uniqueness of this event,
the meaningfulness of this event,
the really powerful nature of this event.
And also the metaphor it has for all the other genocides
(03:29):
that have happened throughout history and the need
for this to put China light on that
and bring it to people's attention in the hope
of avoiding these atrocities from happening
over and over again.
Education about these events,
a genocide, really, not the bike ride necessarily,
but yes, is so important.
(03:51):
At first, we were going to do the documentary just
on the ride, what led to expanding it to focus
on genocide or basically around the world?
But we started talking, Mark and I and Lisa,
a episode producer started talking about it
and talking about the particular root that they followed.
(04:12):
And when it came to light that this route actually trace
the liberation path of this 10 year old boy,
it became fairly obvious that when you're writing
in someone's footsteps, you're taking part
in a collective act of empathy, which was, you know,
it's quite a buzz word back in, well, it has been for years,
but especially in around 2019 when we were getting ready
(04:34):
to actually embark on the chronicling the ride itself.
And then when you juxtapose that to the counterbalance
of empathy, which is the extreme opposite part
of human nature, dehumanization, which is part and parcel
of everything that led to Auschwitz and the, the,
the gravity and cruelty and satism that took place in Auschwitz.
(04:57):
So, very quickly, these two endpoints, Auschwitz, Birkenau,
and the Jewish Community Center in Krakow became symbolic
of dehumanization and empathy.
And I'll mention there that the Krakow JCC,
not only was a place of light and rebirth of Jewish life,
60-months from Krakow, but also became a place
(05:17):
where they were sheltering and giving aid to hundreds
of thousands of Ukrainian refugees of all faiths,
not just Jewish people.
So, they were technically using what they had learned
from their ancestors, experiences in the Holocaust
to try and help rehumanize this flood of humanity.
It was coming across the border in Poland.
So, both of these things are very symbolic
(05:40):
and the ride itself became just a really big allegory
for sort of what we're all going through as,
as a human race from centuries.
You both have connection to the Holocaust yourselves.
How important was it to you guys to, to tell this story,
(06:02):
to shed a light on genocide, to shed a light on the ride,
you know, and, and marry both of them together?
It's a great question, Alan.
For me, I've lost a lot of family in the Holocaust,
so it's always been something that has been a part
(06:22):
of my upbringing and my soul and my being.
And I think it's really important when you see what's going on
in today's world.
I think it's absolutely paramount that,
you know, we make never again, not just a cliche,
but something that we really can stand behind.
(06:43):
And I think, as you mentioned before,
education is our best weapon of helping
avoid these atrocities in the future.
And so we set out to, you know, to bring that ride,
which is the through line of the movie,
but expand into this greater universe of why does this,
(07:04):
why do we still have genocide happening almost 80 years
after the worst mass murder in history?
And what can we do about it?
And as Tim mentioned, you know, empathy is what is our premise is
that is that our best weapon of defense against
things like dehumanization that mostly lead to genocide?
(07:26):
Yeah, my, my connection is twofold.
It's my, my wife, Lisa, who's our producer,
had a lot of family members massacred in what is now Ukraine.
By the Anzots group, which is the mobile killer teams
that used to go into villages, this is all prior to the train cars
(07:46):
bringing people very efficiently and, and horrifically into Auschwitz.
But there's the town of Shomsk, which is a pretty notorious massacre.
She lost dozens of family members there.
And found out about it in the last several years.
But it's become quite a quite a, yeah, there's,
(08:07):
it's interesting how the light when you start looking into genealogy and things like that.
Myself, I'm the one non-Jewish member of this whole team.
I studied the Holocaust very early, like in the high school,
and really went deep in college in a class called literature of the Holocaust.
(08:27):
And literature of the Holocaust had stories of the Holocaust
through different art forms.
Poetry, short stories, music, lyrics,
of course film, of course nonfiction books and fiction books.
But when you approach it through the arts,
you really begin to associate yourself with individuals in history.
(08:51):
And the emotional turmoil they went through,
watching people all around them die.
Eli Wasel's book, Night, was one of those, and dozens of others.
But that, I became very, very attached to this historical event,
just as a fellow human being.
Being like, you know, I wish I had that class.
(09:11):
It was fun.
It was fun.
Well, I can really, I mean,
to should have been mandatory.
Yeah.
That's great.
Agreed.
You know, you mentioned Ukraine, you know, for me,
my parents, my mom died in '07, and my dad,
many years before that.
So they haven't been around.
And then Charlottesville happened, and it made me want to speak up
(09:34):
because I had never seen anything like that.
And then watching the Ukrainian War unfold,
I felt like I finally saw with my own eyes what my parents had lived through, really.
Like the visuals of the Ukrainian War and all of that was very eye-opening to, I think,
(09:55):
what, you know, what we only see in pictures, really, from World War II.
Well, it's important, you know, one of the important points about the Holocaust.
I've always, I've always postulated that this is a film that involves the Holocaust.
This is not a typical Holocaust film.
Right.
Yeah.
Because while it is a big piece of the narrative,
(10:16):
it's really about human nature and how, how these patterns continue,
and they repeat, and they repeat, or they're at least as Timothy
scientists, they're echoes of a previous generation.
But what it does, our hypothesis put forth, and it does is proven out,
is that these are not limited to certain ethnic groups,
(10:37):
both the victims and the perpetrators.
It's not limited to certain ethnic ethnic ethnic ethnic ethnic groups,
it's not limited to certain ethnic ethnic ethnic ethnic groups,
it's not limited to certain ethnic ethnic ethnic ethnic groups,
it's not limited to certain ethnic ethnic ethnic groups,
it's not limited to certain ethnic ethnic groups,
it's not limited to certain ethnic ethnic groups,
it's not limited to certain ethnic ethnic groups,
it's not limited to certain ethnic ethnic groups,
it's not limited to certain ethnic groups,
it's not limited to certain ethnic ethnic groups,
it's not limited to certain ethnic ethnic groups,
it's not limited to certain ethnic ethnic groups,
it's not limited to certain ethnic ethnic groups,
it's not limited to certain ethnic groups,
the humanizing storyline, and it's same thing happened in Rwanda,
(11:03):
and it happened centuries before that,
and it happened in Cambodian, and Bosnia, and on and on and on.
So it's really a kind of, sort of provokes the question genocide and dehumanization,
is it more a feature or a bug of humanity?
Because it is so perpetual,
which is keeps coming and coming and coming.
So one of our things is,
yeah, you've got to finally say never again,
and this time you've got to meet it.
It's true.
What was it like to meet Robert Desmond,
(11:25):
who I believe is credited with inspiring the ride for the living,
and Marcel Zelensky himself,
who I believe is 89 today, and still alive,
what was their reaction to you wanting to do this film?
Well, I think both Tim and I were both,
in awe of both of these people,
(11:49):
both in what they've done to bring this ride to fruition,
but also this wonderful relationship between this older man and this younger boy,
and who are not related, did not know each other at all.
Not a ride, basically brought them together.
And Robert is one of the originators of the ride.
Marcel joined shortly after,
(12:11):
but they never imagined having an actual survivor of Auschwitz on the ride.
It's just that Marcel turned out to be a cyclist,
but what's interesting to me also is,
Marcel, like so many other Holocaust survivors,
wanted to put the pass behind them,
and didn't want to talk about it,
didn't want to teach about it,
didn't want to get into it over and over again.
(12:33):
But when he heard about it,
he was like, "Oh, I'm going to go to the other side of the road."
And he went over again.
But when he heard about the ride,
and he joined the ride,
and he figured,
if I could walk that 60 miles from Auschwitz to Krakow, JCC,
I could do it on a bike.
And just the inter-connectivity of these two people,
(12:59):
there you see them,
it was just really remarkable.
The carrying on of that knowledge of that ethos and everything,
and as one of our main interviewees in the film,
Michael Barembaum, the scholar,
and one of the founders of the Holocaust Museum in Washington,
said,
he said, "Going on the ride or going through Auschwitz,
(13:23):
because before the day before the ride,
there's a tour of Auschwitz,
and to be able to tour Auschwitz with a survivor like Marcel
is unprecedented and unbelievable.
And he compared it to one minute to midnight,
that where these people are in their last years,
so to have that as an enormous privilege,
(13:47):
and for us to be able to document that was a true honor.
And really, I think,
is one of the things that makes the film even that much more powerful,
that you're seeing things that have never been done,
never been filmed before.
What it's like to meet these guys.
And I know you were nervous, right, to interview him?
(14:11):
Certainly. Yeah, Mark and I divided and conquered on this.
He interviewed Robert.
I've come to know Robert really, really well.
We talk all the time.
Now, I went to Montreal to interview Marcel Zelensky,
and I was very nervous because I had,
again, I'd read many accounts.
I've watched lots of testimony on the USC Show of Foundation Library.
But, you know, as a young person,
(14:35):
or relatively young compared to him,
you have to be...
One of the biggest sensitivities is that you're going to say something
or imply something that takes for granted their survival,
or is insensitive in any way,
because, my God, what a heroine can experience.
And I didn't know any of the details until we truly sat down in front of a camera.
(14:57):
But he's not a effusive guy, Marcel.
He doesn't want to share any more than absolutely necessary.
As Mark mentioned, he does do testimony now,
and he does do education.
But asking him just details of his journey,
and details of things he saw in "Plezzoff,"
which is the camp featured in "Shinler's List" with Aiman Gough.
(15:21):
And you just never know what's going to be a breaking point for a person as well.
He's seen things no human should ever see.
And you're just always wondering if the next question is going to take them down into a dark place.
He did quite well.
He was unabashedly emotional,
which we have no problem with.
(15:43):
I mean, it's merits, you know, and merits that.
But, yeah, I was incredibly nervous.
Probably the most nervous I've ever been interviewing another person.
Wow.
I think of my parents who did the show where my sister and I encouraged them to do it.
And, you know, a stranger was interviewing them.
And definitely, you know, like, you know, watching it,
(16:05):
you could see certain things that triggered, you know, those responses.
Was there a message that either of them were concerned with,
Robert or Marcel, about conveying?
Robert's really big in the Holocaust education.
And one of the reasons he loves this film, if I may say so,
is that actually, a lot of the points we make in the film coincidentally
(16:31):
were things that he had been conveying to his friends that he was trying to,
you know, he did that 1,200 mile bike ride on his own.
It's the very beginning of the film.
It's a really nice setup called the Liberation Trail from a Westminster Abbey,
all the way to Auschwitz and then Crackow,
going through all of these world where two sites, some of them having to do with the Holocaust,
(16:52):
most of them having to do with battles, including D-Day and on and on and on.
But one of his big points in starting the ride is it was, it was more of a message about humanity.
And what were capable of them both ends, you know, were capable of this,
this incredible compassion and walking, riding in the footsteps of other people,
(17:14):
and also capable, every single one of us of these horrific acts,
we just have to be in the wrong place, the wrong time and the wrong influence.
So he's a big, he's a big humanist and he really, he was glad that we captured that.
Well, the other thing you captured is their incredible friendship,
a masterclass on empathy.
(17:37):
What was it like to watch them interact?
I mean, they almost seemed like father and son and they are strangers who came together.
More like brothers, but that's interesting.
You said a masterclass on empathy because that is a great description of it.
And watching that relationship evolve through the movie,
(18:00):
and as filmmakers to be able to interview both of them,
even with the, you know, sensitivity of them, subject matter and wanting to be,
you know, not wanting to say anything wrong,
I think I was really moved by how much they both were willing to share with us,
and open their hearts and lives through their stories of, you know, something that, you know,
(18:27):
when you hear that story told firsthand, it's really, really powerful.
And it really allows you to be there and visualize what it was like for both of them,
going through that.
And their relationship was very special.
And I think it's one of the, my favorite threads of the film.
(18:48):
I was going to say, and the way you wrap it up with them is really,
leave it to the viewer to watch it and experience it because it's absolutely beautiful.
You know, one of the biggest secrets to doing that is sometimes you want to capture a moment,
but sometimes you want to just let the camera go. You want to go early and you want to let it go late.
(19:09):
And you capture some of the most authentic touching moments when you just let it roll.
And these people are in the environment together. They know there's a camera there,
but it's not reality TV. It's very, very different because they honestly,
well, I don't want to give anything away, but they had to.
Let's put it that way.
I will say one thing we haven't touched on this much in a lot of interviews, but, you know,
(19:34):
it's unique to co direct a documentary with somebody.
So, you know, this originally was a much smaller story and it grew into a much bigger story.
And I can honestly say I couldn't have done it without him and his, you know,
incredible knowledge of history and his unique curiosity.
But also it made, like he mentioned before, we were able to divide and conquer.
(19:59):
And, you know, he would be in Quebec filming Marcel.
I was in crackout filming the other half of a conversation.
So it really, you know, made doing this much easier and more enjoyable.
And also it's so great to have somebody to really bounce ideas off of.
(20:20):
And, you know, we spent so many hours filming and then hundreds of hours in the editing room.
You know, if you don't get along, you're toast.
But I think we really, it was, I just, I think creativity together, you know, ideas come.
But also, it was a blessing that Tim has the education of the Holocaust because not every director does.
(20:43):
I mean, you really studied it and knew and sort of telling this.
And his knowledge of history was essential to making this film work.
Wow.
Well, trust me.
No, there's, I had a basic underpinning knowledge of all of these incidents that we cover in the film.
But truly, it took a lot of research before, during and after to get into the details.
(21:05):
And testimony, testimony is an invaluable thing.
Again, USC show a foundation has a wealth of testimony of several genocides.
And I studied Cambodia, actual survivors, recounting their events, Bosnia, Armenia, Rwanda, most certainly.
(21:29):
And there was, and this, I, we always love this image because we didn't get really captures a lot of the hypothesis.
Whereas, never again, has become this mantra, almost, I don't want to disrespect the use of it.
But let's be honest, it's used a lot.
And it has to be used and recycled so much is a pretty sad testimony on the trajectory of mankind right now.
(21:59):
I'd like to point out one thing on that slide, Alan, is that if you notice all of the dates there, but the one that is not having a completion date is Darfur.
And that was really interesting for us because, you know, we wanted, as filmmakers, to make a point at the end of the film to say, this is still going on.
(22:22):
And we were going to originally have Darfur covered in the movie to show an example of a genocide that is still going on today.
But when Ukraine, when Russian invaded Ukraine, we thought that that was even more relevant because it was much more in the, in the, you know, the public domain and on the news and in everybody's consciousness.
(22:46):
So we kind of decided to focus on Ukraine because it was so much more immediate.
But Darfur, as in that cartoon, is still going on as well.
So it's interesting that, you know, it's one of the points we try to make in the film.
(23:07):
I mean, we're not learning.
Yeah, we have, you know, there's, I've come up with my own cliche and that is numbers make us numb.
And that's absolutely true.
Is that the beginning of the film very much is a commentary on the indifference that we have to these mass numbers of human casualties when it comes to genocide.
(23:28):
When you say six million, no one can really even visually comprehend that.
So empathy has, it's, we all know empathy has a bias and it has limits. But when you get past the number, I think scientists would say 100, it really starts to fall off, especially when people don't look like you don't speak like you don't worship like you don't come from customs that you recognize.
(23:51):
But when it gets into six million, it's just a blob in the back of your mind. So you have to concentrate on individuals like Anne Frank. That's why that story is so, so rich in human history.
That it's a, it's a face that you can attach to it is a human experience.
She's a diary with her own thoughts and feelings and, and, and inspirations.
(24:14):
The education's catching up in that regard. There are a lot of classes now like the classrooms that we documented that are teaching things like citizens throughout history or individuals in history, whether it be Harriet Tubman or someone that's just completely obscure.
Ken Burns is a fantastic job at that in all of his series where they'll go high level, high altitude on all these major events.
(24:37):
And then they'll drill back down into an individual that lives in a certain locality that went through this aspect of the story and another one over here and another one over here.
And then they have people, you know, doing their voices.
We tried to capture that in our own way by doing second person narration, which puts you in the place of a 10 year old Cambodian girl, eight year old, Rwandan boy and so forth.
(25:02):
Without, I wouldn't say inconvenience, but without the, the slow pace of testimony, which we would probably have a seven hour film if we depended on all testimony.
What was it like shooting the actual ride?
Well, that was amazing shot, by the way.
(25:25):
Yeah, we had originally we thought, you know, OK, one or two cameras, a couple interviews, you know, powerful ride, but that was it.
But when we got to Poland and we're scouting it and we saw what really 60 miles meant and the magnificent journey through the Polish countryside.
(25:48):
And we really started to think that to really put the audience in the ride to feel like you're one of the riders.
We really needed to go all out and again, thankfully we had great executive producers that believed in the vision and we're willing to, you know, expand the budget to accommodate us.
But we had, you know, a number of different cameras. We had guys on motorcycles with cameras shooting off the back of motorcycles off scooters. We had GoPro's, we had drones.
(26:19):
We had stationary camera men along the ride. It was a, it was a very complicated and intricate dance.
But with all the goal of to really put you in the seat of one of those riders into.
To kind of give you the feeling of what it was like and I, we were really lucky. We had some amazing cinematographers and camera men that really contributed to making that visual part of it.
(26:48):
And it was also the bike ride in itself, the motion of the ride is very symbolic of the journey. So we really wanted to capture that in as much detail and variety of different angles and perspectives and give it a real sense of emotion.
Well, it's a balance of scope and intimacy really is what it is, you know, I mean, you want to get the birds eye view to give you an idea that mass of humanity, the 250 people that were involved in the singular event.
(27:22):
But also you get in very tight and you can start focusing on individuals and what they're going through with whether they're finding a challenging or what's going through their mind.
And I think we interview them on the side of the road at one of the rest stops. But yeah, intimacy, emotion, balanced with big scope and big high altitude, both of physically, but of history as well.
(27:44):
And I believe the 2024 was their 10th, right? I think they started in 2014.
Yes, 2014 was the first year. Yeah, yeah, wow. And then while the pandemic intervened, yeah, yeah, virtual world for a year or two years, I can't remember now.
But the year that takes place in our film is 2019 is a very singular big, big deal year because there was another, there's another survivor in this story as well.
(28:16):
I don't want to give that away, but yeah, he's even older than Marcel. Yeah.
That was amazing when they shared his age too. So that was great.
You touched on the research. I believe you said backstage 918 photos and clips.
(28:38):
What was the research like? I mean, you're telling the story of genocide and all of those on that cartoon image.
How do you, where do you go for all that information?
Well, it's a combination of stock and then just sleuthing through the web.
(29:00):
You know, when you know the intimate details of the story had to write the narration first. But you know, like when the narration was based on testimony to a degree, when you know the rise and fall of the story and the tension points, then you start imagining how that plays out visually.
Then you want to have a lot of options for every beat. So you've got to probably going to have six or eight visual options for just a phrase or a sentence of narration.
(29:31):
And then you start to narrow down, down, down, but it was grueling is one of words.
It's grueling and I have to be honest. It's quite disputing because you're looking through a lot of dark, dark, dark content.
Whether it's, you know, dead bodies in Rwanda, which obviously no one would enter dead bodies in Rwanda is your Google search.
(29:54):
But are you getting searched? But you start to get into the details. Then you have to ask very detailed questions.
And I've often kind of halfway joked with the team that I'm sure there's a department of department of Homeland Security file on me based on all of the search language that was put in there.
(30:15):
From from early Native Americans in slave trade all the way through Ukraine. It's it's dark stuff by design.
But it's there. It's, you know, it's there for a reason. It's there to show that we're all capable of this.
Again, regardless of background or ethnicity, we're all capable of these kinds of acts are the temptation to commit these kinds of acts.
(30:38):
But we're all also capable of the other end of the spectrum, which is the aesthetic side. I will also say though that it's one of the most exciting parts of filmmaking for me as a director.
And I know Tim shares that I'm feeling is that you're, you know, it's an exhaustive and painstaking search for the right images, whether it's dark images or just images to help tell the story.
(31:06):
And it's it's so exciting, you know, building this visual tapestry and to support your narrative.
It's really exciting and it's it's also a journey of discovery because you, you know, you need a shot here of Nuremberg and you know, start looking and, you know, it's not until you find it.
(31:27):
You maybe find 10 shots and you go, oh, that's the one. So it's a really it's a really fun and exciting process and it's an exhausting one.
But it's it's also very inspiring. I it's one of the parts of documentary filmmaking that I love the best is that you're really pulling from all these different sources, whether it's filming of a live event or an interview to still photographs to news footage to magazine clips to video footage.
(31:55):
You know, it's it's it's endless and then figuring a way to weave that all together so that it works cohesively. It's a very exciting process.
I love that you also bring the narrative of the film to life with incredible interviews and commentary from academics like Timothy Snyder, Neil de Grasse Tyson.
(32:20):
And I mean an incredible interview with Ben Forens, who prosecuted Nazis in the Nuremberg Warcrime trials in the late 40s.
What in your opinion do these interviews and their commentary add to the film?
Well, they give you context from a historical point of view. Certainly because we did a very intentional job of weaving between the intimate and emotional and the more detached academic high level historical review of it.
(32:56):
But Michael Barronbaum for instance, was was was a big inspiration for the second person description of experience when when he was describing.
I believe it was the day after we documented the Auschwitz tour. We sat in a in a little enclave and crack down both Mark and I were there.
And the way he is able to describe a day in the life of an Auschwitz prisoner and what it's like to go through every step of the chain from you know arrival to incineration frankly and all the the dehumanizing and sadistic things that happened you in between.
(33:36):
He would always describe that as you you you know all your possessions are taken. You're led into a shower you're told to hang up your clothes on a hook you you you you.
And but the Snyder and some of these other folks we we knew we needed a little more I'd read a lot of Timothy Snyder's writings and we knew we needed some more.
(34:02):
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(34:22):
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(34:44):
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(35:06):
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(35:28):
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(35:50):
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(36:12):
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(36:34):
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(36:56):
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(37:18):
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(37:40):
And so I think that's the way it was.
And so many ways on top of the emotional element of the ride.
Yeah, you mentioned education earlier.
What I meant to add on to that is education is Ben Friends used to talk about this.
There's like three pillars for the stool of avoiding genocide.
There's law, international law.
(38:02):
There's education and memorialization.
And the other one is you got to make people care.
And you get to know your knowledge alone, academia courses, museums, they can make you interested and they can bring you in.
But they can only bring you so far.
You have to, as Mother Teresa, but you have to associate with the one.
(38:24):
When you think of the many, you do nothing.
But when you think of the one, then you begin to embody that experience that they went through.
And in the back half of the film, we make that point quite, quite stridently that you cannot change the mind until the hardest change.
That's another element of the film I did love is like the Mother Teresa saying that you put up a lot of great quotes throughout the film as well.
(38:50):
That I think are impactful for the story you're telling.
Well, that's again going back to the point of this tapestry.
Quotes were just another element that could help tell the story and make a point.
And Tim's knowledge of history was really valuable there where he was able to pull out some great ones.
(39:14):
I think it really helps the narrative and really allows the viewer to really be a part of the story and not feel like they're being preached to but feel like they're learning along as they go.
And we were very, very deliberate on that.
How we established the pacing and the weaving together of the different stories and incorporating these other genocides as well.
(39:41):
And I think both Tim and I and Lisa and the rest of our team were very happy with the outcome.
Well, the film has played at a number of festivals, a number one really very important one in the Hague.
Tim, will you tell us about that?
(40:02):
I went, I honored the family that hid my family during the war and we honored them at the Israeli consulate in the Hague.
Oh, wow. That's fascinating. I mean, that's terrific.
Here's the deal with the Hague. The festival, international festival at the Hague is the shortest festival of all the festivals.
(40:25):
It's literally two very important events in the Netherlands. So we are an official selection and they then they go to the next round of finalists to see whether you actually screen.
And then you go to another round after that to see if you screen with a conversation.
So we, I don't know that we're going to make it to the final final stage of that, but we're honored to be in consideration and in a festival like that.
(40:56):
And a lot of the other festivals that were entered and we're waiting here back on now are very much human rights focused festivals.
I've talked about social justice and in common humanity and a lot of these have cropped up within the last several years and I'll take any of those over a Sunday and any day of the week because it's really it's filmmaking and storytelling with great intent and purpose.
(41:19):
And I think right now, I mean, this very moment in history, maybe even the last 24 hours.
There's nothing more important than emphasizing common humanity because we've been through we've been through a pretty long stretch right now where dehumanization is a brand.
It's one it was a campaign brand and and it's quite possible in the next year, two years, three years.
(41:46):
We're going to have to answer that question that Stephen Smith posed if someone's strangers knocking on your door in the middle of the night and someone's trying to take them away.
Are you going to risk your own life to help them?
And I'm not a big pro cruelty guy.
So I would tell you first and foremost right now, I would stand up, but it's scary.
(42:07):
It's scary.
It is very scary.
I think back to your class, like this film is so perfect for the class that you took in college.
Good point. I'll have to go to the university.
It really is.
This weekend, you have a film festival, the Fort Lauderdale International Film Festival screening on Sunday November 10th, correct?
(42:29):
Correct.
2pm.
And are you doing a Q&A after?
Yeah, Mark's not making this one. This one will be Lisa and I.
Oh, okay.
We will be dividing the anchor.
The link is up down below on YouTube.
I know some viewers were asking where they can see it. They should go to for the living movie dot com because you'll have it up when the film is released and where people can see it.
(42:56):
On the website for the living movie dot com.
There's a page with all the festivals and a link where you can buy tickets.
There's the trailer, the synopsis, the crew. There's a ton of information, all the press.
This will be up there eventually, this chat.
(43:18):
So yeah, that is the best source for finding out where the film is playing, when it will be distributed, etc.
I just want to say, if you're in a situation right now as an American citizen and you're looking around you and you're wondering,
where's the empathy gone? What is it about us as a people?
It has caused that that innate human mechanism to break down.
(43:43):
This is a film you need to see because we get into the roots of that, but we also get into the other side, which is
at least a conversation that might get us to a solution.
Our discourse has really, really gotten ugly, uglier than ugly, and not only dehumanizing, but there's genocide of language used on social media all the time now.
(44:04):
Some of it involves conflicts overseas and some of it is just human beings being our own American citizens.
Yeah, and it's bad stuff, but it's not normal.
Ben Forens, at 103, just passed away, one of the most important quotes from him in our film is that, you know,
(44:25):
out of everything he's seen, standing up to not season a courtroom in Nuremberg, and then the rise of fall of communism and genocide after genocide leading up to the 2000s.
He said the era we're living, the era we're living through right now is the most dangerous he's ever seen.
So that's, that tells me a lot, tells me that my gut is right about it, but it also, I have great reverence for that man and his perspective on history.
(44:52):
I mean, he's seen it all at 103.
Yes.
Living through that period of time.
Gentlemen, thank you for making this movie.
Thank you for spending this time with me to talk about it.
Really congratulations.
Thank you.
Thank you so much.
Thank you, Alan, and thanks for having us.
(45:13):
My pleasure. Good luck with all the festivals and the Fort Lauderdale International is November 10th, and the link is up on YouTube down below.
Have a great evening, gents.
See you all there.
Good night.
Thanks everybody for watching.
Again, thank you to Mark Bennett and Tim Roper for being here to discuss this powerful new documentary for more information.
(45:37):
Remember, for the LivingMovie.com.
As I leave you remember, we all have choices to make in life.
Speak up, do the hard thing, and let's all fight hate for good.
I truly believe conversations like this can change the world around us.
War, hate is not the answer. Feel free to share this episode with your friends and family.
(45:59):
Until the next conversation, please stay safe.
[Music]
[ Silence ]
(00:11):
>> Good evening, everybody.
Thank you for joining me for the Conversation
with Alan series.
I'm Alan Locker, and I'm the child
of two Holocaust survivors.
I created this series to have honest discussions
about the rise of anti-Semitism and hate,
with high hopes that it leads to conversations
that make us all think about our place in history,
and to inspire collective action to eradicate hate
(00:33):
in all its forms.
Conversations like this are more crucial now than ever
in the face of rising anti-Semitism worldwide.
Writer, director and producer Mark Bennett,
and his co-writer and director Tim Roper invite us
to explore humanity's most essential question.
When will we truly say never again and commit
(00:53):
to breaking the cycle of dehumanization?
At the heart of their powerful new documentary
for the living is the harrowing story of Marcel Zalinski,
a 10-year-old Holocaust survivor who after spending two years
in a death camp is liberated by incoming Russian forces
from Auschwitz-Birkenau in January of 1945.
Marcel then embarked on a 60-mile journey by foot
(01:16):
through Warzone in search of his surviving family.
Decades later, Marcel's journey was honored by RIDE
for the living in an international cycling event
where 250 cyclists from around the world
traced Marcel's liberation path.
This powerful tribute serves as both a historical commemoration
and a modern call to action urging us to nurture empathy and compassion.
(01:40):
With their film, Mark and Tim ask us to reflect,
how do we dehumanize in an error marred by dehumanization?
How do we shift from merely memorializing the dead
to reawakening compassion for the living?
Please help me welcome to the locker room and conversations
with Alan, Tim Roper and Mark Bennett.
Hello, gentlemen.
(02:04):
Thank you so much for being here.
Hi, thanks for having us.
The documentary, as I told you backstage,
it is incredibly powerful, educational,
and truly so incredibly timely.
I'd love to learn how you first learned about the ride
(02:24):
for the living.
Well, our executive producer, Melinda Goldrich,
is a cyclist and a daughter of a Holocaust survivor.
And she became aware of this event in Poland,
created and hosted by the Crackout JCC.
(02:45):
And she was fascinated by it in its uniqueness
to think about a bike ride commemorating the Holocaust
and raising money for the Holocaust survivors
that they take care of at the JCC.
And she was so intrigued with it that we started to look
into possibly doing a film to explain this
(03:06):
and showcase this amazing event.
And that's how we became interested in it.
And I think Tim and I's curiosity was both peaked
by the uniqueness of this event,
the meaningfulness of this event,
the really powerful nature of this event.
And also the metaphor it has for all the other genocides
(03:29):
that have happened throughout history and the need
for this to put China light on that
and bring it to people's attention in the hope
of avoiding these atrocities from happening
over and over again.
Education about these events,
a genocide, really, not the bike ride necessarily,
but yes, is so important.
(03:51):
At first, we were going to do the documentary just
on the ride, what led to expanding it to focus
on genocide or basically around the world?
But we started talking, Mark and I and Lisa,
a episode producer started talking about it
and talking about the particular root that they followed.
(04:12):
And when it came to light that this route actually trace
the liberation path of this 10 year old boy,
it became fairly obvious that when you're writing
in someone's footsteps, you're taking part
in a collective act of empathy, which was, you know,
it's quite a buzz word back in, well, it has been for years,
but especially in around 2019 when we were getting ready
(04:34):
to actually embark on the chronicling the ride itself.
And then when you juxtapose that to the counterbalance
of empathy, which is the extreme opposite part
of human nature, dehumanization, which is part and parcel
of everything that led to Auschwitz and the, the,
the gravity and cruelty and satism that took place in Auschwitz.
(04:57):
So, very quickly, these two endpoints, Auschwitz, Birkenau,
and the Jewish Community Center in Krakow became symbolic
of dehumanization and empathy.
And I'll mention there that the Krakow JCC,
not only was a place of light and rebirth of Jewish life,
60-months from Krakow, but also became a place
(05:17):
where they were sheltering and giving aid to hundreds
of thousands of Ukrainian refugees of all faiths,
not just Jewish people.
So, they were technically using what they had learned
from their ancestors, experiences in the Holocaust
to try and help rehumanize this flood of humanity.
It was coming across the border in Poland.
So, both of these things are very symbolic
(05:40):
and the ride itself became just a really big allegory
for sort of what we're all going through as,
as a human race from centuries.
You both have connection to the Holocaust yourselves.
How important was it to you guys to, to tell this story,
(06:02):
to shed a light on genocide, to shed a light on the ride,
you know, and, and marry both of them together?
It's a great question, Alan.
For me, I've lost a lot of family in the Holocaust,
so it's always been something that has been a part
(06:22):
of my upbringing and my soul and my being.
And I think it's really important when you see what's going on
in today's world.
I think it's absolutely paramount that,
you know, we make never again, not just a cliche,
but something that we really can stand behind.
(06:43):
And I think, as you mentioned before,
education is our best weapon of helping
avoid these atrocities in the future.
And so we set out to, you know, to bring that ride,
which is the through line of the movie,
but expand into this greater universe of why does this,
(07:04):
why do we still have genocide happening almost 80 years
after the worst mass murder in history?
And what can we do about it?
And as Tim mentioned, you know, empathy is what is our premise is
that is that our best weapon of defense against
things like dehumanization that mostly lead to genocide?
(07:26):
Yeah, my, my connection is twofold.
It's my, my wife, Lisa, who's our producer,
had a lot of family members massacred in what is now Ukraine.
By the Anzots group, which is the mobile killer teams
that used to go into villages, this is all prior to the train cars
(07:46):
bringing people very efficiently and, and horrifically into Auschwitz.
But there's the town of Shomsk, which is a pretty notorious massacre.
She lost dozens of family members there.
And found out about it in the last several years.
But it's become quite a quite a, yeah, there's,
(08:07):
it's interesting how the light when you start looking into genealogy and things like that.
Myself, I'm the one non-Jewish member of this whole team.
I studied the Holocaust very early, like in the high school,
and really went deep in college in a class called literature of the Holocaust.
(08:27):
And literature of the Holocaust had stories of the Holocaust
through different art forms.
Poetry, short stories, music, lyrics,
of course film, of course nonfiction books and fiction books.
But when you approach it through the arts,
you really begin to associate yourself with individuals in history.
(08:51):
And the emotional turmoil they went through,
watching people all around them die.
Eli Wasel's book, Night, was one of those, and dozens of others.
But that, I became very, very attached to this historical event,
just as a fellow human being.
Being like, you know, I wish I had that class.
(09:11):
It was fun.
It was fun.
Well, I can really, I mean,
to should have been mandatory.
Yeah.
That's great.
Agreed.
You know, you mentioned Ukraine, you know, for me,
my parents, my mom died in '07, and my dad,
many years before that.
So they haven't been around.
And then Charlottesville happened, and it made me want to speak up
(09:34):
because I had never seen anything like that.
And then watching the Ukrainian War unfold,
I felt like I finally saw with my own eyes what my parents had lived through, really.
Like the visuals of the Ukrainian War and all of that was very eye-opening to, I think,
(09:55):
what, you know, what we only see in pictures, really, from World War II.
Well, it's important, you know, one of the important points about the Holocaust.
I've always, I've always postulated that this is a film that involves the Holocaust.
This is not a typical Holocaust film.
Right.
Yeah.
Because while it is a big piece of the narrative,
(10:16):
it's really about human nature and how, how these patterns continue,
and they repeat, and they repeat, or they're at least as Timothy
scientists, they're echoes of a previous generation.
But what it does, our hypothesis put forth, and it does is proven out,
is that these are not limited to certain ethnic groups,
(10:37):
both the victims and the perpetrators.
It's not limited to certain ethnic ethnic ethnic ethnic ethnic groups,
it's not limited to certain ethnic ethnic ethnic ethnic groups,
it's not limited to certain ethnic ethnic ethnic ethnic groups,
it's not limited to certain ethnic ethnic ethnic groups,
it's not limited to certain ethnic ethnic groups,
it's not limited to certain ethnic ethnic groups,
it's not limited to certain ethnic ethnic groups,
it's not limited to certain ethnic ethnic groups,
it's not limited to certain ethnic groups,
it's not limited to certain ethnic ethnic groups,
it's not limited to certain ethnic ethnic groups,
it's not limited to certain ethnic ethnic groups,
it's not limited to certain ethnic ethnic groups,
it's not limited to certain ethnic groups,
the humanizing storyline, and it's same thing happened in Rwanda,
(11:03):
and it happened centuries before that,
and it happened in Cambodian, and Bosnia, and on and on and on.
So it's really a kind of, sort of provokes the question genocide and dehumanization,
is it more a feature or a bug of humanity?
Because it is so perpetual,
which is keeps coming and coming and coming.
So one of our things is,
yeah, you've got to finally say never again,
and this time you've got to meet it.
It's true.
What was it like to meet Robert Desmond,
(11:25):
who I believe is credited with inspiring the ride for the living,
and Marcel Zelensky himself,
who I believe is 89 today, and still alive,
what was their reaction to you wanting to do this film?
Well, I think both Tim and I were both,
in awe of both of these people,
(11:49):
both in what they've done to bring this ride to fruition,
but also this wonderful relationship between this older man and this younger boy,
and who are not related, did not know each other at all.
Not a ride, basically brought them together.
And Robert is one of the originators of the ride.
Marcel joined shortly after,
(12:11):
but they never imagined having an actual survivor of Auschwitz on the ride.
It's just that Marcel turned out to be a cyclist,
but what's interesting to me also is,
Marcel, like so many other Holocaust survivors,
wanted to put the pass behind them,
and didn't want to talk about it,
didn't want to teach about it,
didn't want to get into it over and over again.
(12:33):
But when he heard about it,
he was like, "Oh, I'm going to go to the other side of the road."
And he went over again.
But when he heard about the ride,
and he joined the ride,
and he figured,
if I could walk that 60 miles from Auschwitz to Krakow, JCC,
I could do it on a bike.
And just the inter-connectivity of these two people,
(12:59):
there you see them,
it was just really remarkable.
The carrying on of that knowledge of that ethos and everything,
and as one of our main interviewees in the film,
Michael Barembaum, the scholar,
and one of the founders of the Holocaust Museum in Washington,
said,
he said, "Going on the ride or going through Auschwitz,
(13:23):
because before the day before the ride,
there's a tour of Auschwitz,
and to be able to tour Auschwitz with a survivor like Marcel
is unprecedented and unbelievable.
And he compared it to one minute to midnight,
that where these people are in their last years,
so to have that as an enormous privilege,
(13:47):
and for us to be able to document that was a true honor.
And really, I think,
is one of the things that makes the film even that much more powerful,
that you're seeing things that have never been done,
never been filmed before.
What it's like to meet these guys.
And I know you were nervous, right, to interview him?
(14:11):
Certainly. Yeah, Mark and I divided and conquered on this.
He interviewed Robert.
I've come to know Robert really, really well.
We talk all the time.
Now, I went to Montreal to interview Marcel Zelensky,
and I was very nervous because I had,
again, I'd read many accounts.
I've watched lots of testimony on the USC Show of Foundation Library.
But, you know, as a young person,
(14:35):
or relatively young compared to him,
you have to be...
One of the biggest sensitivities is that you're going to say something
or imply something that takes for granted their survival,
or is insensitive in any way,
because, my God, what a heroine can experience.
And I didn't know any of the details until we truly sat down in front of a camera.
(14:57):
But he's not a effusive guy, Marcel.
He doesn't want to share any more than absolutely necessary.
As Mark mentioned, he does do testimony now,
and he does do education.
But asking him just details of his journey,
and details of things he saw in "Plezzoff,"
which is the camp featured in "Shinler's List" with Aiman Gough.
(15:21):
And you just never know what's going to be a breaking point for a person as well.
He's seen things no human should ever see.
And you're just always wondering if the next question is going to take them down into a dark place.
He did quite well.
He was unabashedly emotional,
which we have no problem with.
(15:43):
I mean, it's merits, you know, and merits that.
But, yeah, I was incredibly nervous.
Probably the most nervous I've ever been interviewing another person.
Wow.
I think of my parents who did the show where my sister and I encouraged them to do it.
And, you know, a stranger was interviewing them.
And definitely, you know, like, you know, watching it,
(16:05):
you could see certain things that triggered, you know, those responses.
Was there a message that either of them were concerned with,
Robert or Marcel, about conveying?
Robert's really big in the Holocaust education.
And one of the reasons he loves this film, if I may say so,
is that actually, a lot of the points we make in the film coincidentally
(16:31):
were things that he had been conveying to his friends that he was trying to,
you know, he did that 1,200 mile bike ride on his own.
It's the very beginning of the film.
It's a really nice setup called the Liberation Trail from a Westminster Abbey,
all the way to Auschwitz and then Crackow,
going through all of these world where two sites, some of them having to do with the Holocaust,
(16:52):
most of them having to do with battles, including D-Day and on and on and on.
But one of his big points in starting the ride is it was, it was more of a message about humanity.
And what were capable of them both ends, you know, were capable of this,
this incredible compassion and walking, riding in the footsteps of other people,
(17:14):
and also capable, every single one of us of these horrific acts,
we just have to be in the wrong place, the wrong time and the wrong influence.
So he's a big, he's a big humanist and he really, he was glad that we captured that.
Well, the other thing you captured is their incredible friendship,
a masterclass on empathy.
(17:37):
What was it like to watch them interact?
I mean, they almost seemed like father and son and they are strangers who came together.
More like brothers, but that's interesting.
You said a masterclass on empathy because that is a great description of it.
And watching that relationship evolve through the movie,
(18:00):
and as filmmakers to be able to interview both of them,
even with the, you know, sensitivity of them, subject matter and wanting to be,
you know, not wanting to say anything wrong,
I think I was really moved by how much they both were willing to share with us,
and open their hearts and lives through their stories of, you know, something that, you know,
(18:27):
when you hear that story told firsthand, it's really, really powerful.
And it really allows you to be there and visualize what it was like for both of them,
going through that.
And their relationship was very special.
And I think it's one of the, my favorite threads of the film.
(18:48):
I was going to say, and the way you wrap it up with them is really,
leave it to the viewer to watch it and experience it because it's absolutely beautiful.
You know, one of the biggest secrets to doing that is sometimes you want to capture a moment,
but sometimes you want to just let the camera go. You want to go early and you want to let it go late.
(19:09):
And you capture some of the most authentic touching moments when you just let it roll.
And these people are in the environment together. They know there's a camera there,
but it's not reality TV. It's very, very different because they honestly,
well, I don't want to give anything away, but they had to.
Let's put it that way.
I will say one thing we haven't touched on this much in a lot of interviews, but, you know,
(19:34):
it's unique to co direct a documentary with somebody.
So, you know, this originally was a much smaller story and it grew into a much bigger story.
And I can honestly say I couldn't have done it without him and his, you know,
incredible knowledge of history and his unique curiosity.
But also it made, like he mentioned before, we were able to divide and conquer.
(19:59):
And, you know, he would be in Quebec filming Marcel.
I was in crackout filming the other half of a conversation.
So it really, you know, made doing this much easier and more enjoyable.
And also it's so great to have somebody to really bounce ideas off of.
(20:20):
And, you know, we spent so many hours filming and then hundreds of hours in the editing room.
You know, if you don't get along, you're toast.
But I think we really, it was, I just, I think creativity together, you know, ideas come.
But also, it was a blessing that Tim has the education of the Holocaust because not every director does.
(20:43):
I mean, you really studied it and knew and sort of telling this.
And his knowledge of history was essential to making this film work.
Wow.
Well, trust me.
No, there's, I had a basic underpinning knowledge of all of these incidents that we cover in the film.
But truly, it took a lot of research before, during and after to get into the details.
(21:05):
And testimony, testimony is an invaluable thing.
Again, USC show a foundation has a wealth of testimony of several genocides.
And I studied Cambodia, actual survivors, recounting their events, Bosnia, Armenia, Rwanda, most certainly.
(21:29):
And there was, and this, I, we always love this image because we didn't get really captures a lot of the hypothesis.
Whereas, never again, has become this mantra, almost, I don't want to disrespect the use of it.
But let's be honest, it's used a lot.
And it has to be used and recycled so much is a pretty sad testimony on the trajectory of mankind right now.
(21:59):
I'd like to point out one thing on that slide, Alan, is that if you notice all of the dates there, but the one that is not having a completion date is Darfur.
And that was really interesting for us because, you know, we wanted, as filmmakers, to make a point at the end of the film to say, this is still going on.
(22:22):
And we were going to originally have Darfur covered in the movie to show an example of a genocide that is still going on today.
But when Ukraine, when Russian invaded Ukraine, we thought that that was even more relevant because it was much more in the, in the, you know, the public domain and on the news and in everybody's consciousness.
(22:46):
So we kind of decided to focus on Ukraine because it was so much more immediate.
But Darfur, as in that cartoon, is still going on as well.
So it's interesting that, you know, it's one of the points we try to make in the film.
(23:07):
I mean, we're not learning.
Yeah, we have, you know, there's, I've come up with my own cliche and that is numbers make us numb.
And that's absolutely true.
Is that the beginning of the film very much is a commentary on the indifference that we have to these mass numbers of human casualties when it comes to genocide.
(23:28):
When you say six million, no one can really even visually comprehend that.
So empathy has, it's, we all know empathy has a bias and it has limits. But when you get past the number, I think scientists would say 100, it really starts to fall off, especially when people don't look like you don't speak like you don't worship like you don't come from customs that you recognize.
(23:51):
But when it gets into six million, it's just a blob in the back of your mind. So you have to concentrate on individuals like Anne Frank. That's why that story is so, so rich in human history.
That it's a, it's a face that you can attach to it is a human experience.
She's a diary with her own thoughts and feelings and, and, and inspirations.
(24:14):
The education's catching up in that regard. There are a lot of classes now like the classrooms that we documented that are teaching things like citizens throughout history or individuals in history, whether it be Harriet Tubman or someone that's just completely obscure.
Ken Burns is a fantastic job at that in all of his series where they'll go high level, high altitude on all these major events.
(24:37):
And then they'll drill back down into an individual that lives in a certain locality that went through this aspect of the story and another one over here and another one over here.
And then they have people, you know, doing their voices.
We tried to capture that in our own way by doing second person narration, which puts you in the place of a 10 year old Cambodian girl, eight year old, Rwandan boy and so forth.
(25:02):
Without, I wouldn't say inconvenience, but without the, the slow pace of testimony, which we would probably have a seven hour film if we depended on all testimony.
What was it like shooting the actual ride?
Well, that was amazing shot, by the way.
(25:25):
Yeah, we had originally we thought, you know, OK, one or two cameras, a couple interviews, you know, powerful ride, but that was it.
But when we got to Poland and we're scouting it and we saw what really 60 miles meant and the magnificent journey through the Polish countryside.
(25:48):
And we really started to think that to really put the audience in the ride to feel like you're one of the riders.
We really needed to go all out and again, thankfully we had great executive producers that believed in the vision and we're willing to, you know, expand the budget to accommodate us.
But we had, you know, a number of different cameras. We had guys on motorcycles with cameras shooting off the back of motorcycles off scooters. We had GoPro's, we had drones.
(26:19):
We had stationary camera men along the ride. It was a, it was a very complicated and intricate dance.
But with all the goal of to really put you in the seat of one of those riders into.
To kind of give you the feeling of what it was like and I, we were really lucky. We had some amazing cinematographers and camera men that really contributed to making that visual part of it.
(26:48):
And it was also the bike ride in itself, the motion of the ride is very symbolic of the journey. So we really wanted to capture that in as much detail and variety of different angles and perspectives and give it a real sense of emotion.
Well, it's a balance of scope and intimacy really is what it is, you know, I mean, you want to get the birds eye view to give you an idea that mass of humanity, the 250 people that were involved in the singular event.
(27:22):
But also you get in very tight and you can start focusing on individuals and what they're going through with whether they're finding a challenging or what's going through their mind.
And I think we interview them on the side of the road at one of the rest stops. But yeah, intimacy, emotion, balanced with big scope and big high altitude, both of physically, but of history as well.
(27:44):
And I believe the 2024 was their 10th, right? I think they started in 2014.
Yes, 2014 was the first year. Yeah, yeah, wow. And then while the pandemic intervened, yeah, yeah, virtual world for a year or two years, I can't remember now.
But the year that takes place in our film is 2019 is a very singular big, big deal year because there was another, there's another survivor in this story as well.
(28:16):
I don't want to give that away, but yeah, he's even older than Marcel. Yeah.
That was amazing when they shared his age too. So that was great.
You touched on the research. I believe you said backstage 918 photos and clips.
(28:38):
What was the research like? I mean, you're telling the story of genocide and all of those on that cartoon image.
How do you, where do you go for all that information?
Well, it's a combination of stock and then just sleuthing through the web.
(29:00):
You know, when you know the intimate details of the story had to write the narration first. But you know, like when the narration was based on testimony to a degree, when you know the rise and fall of the story and the tension points, then you start imagining how that plays out visually.
Then you want to have a lot of options for every beat. So you've got to probably going to have six or eight visual options for just a phrase or a sentence of narration.
(29:31):
And then you start to narrow down, down, down, but it was grueling is one of words.
It's grueling and I have to be honest. It's quite disputing because you're looking through a lot of dark, dark, dark content.
Whether it's, you know, dead bodies in Rwanda, which obviously no one would enter dead bodies in Rwanda is your Google search.
(29:54):
But are you getting searched? But you start to get into the details. Then you have to ask very detailed questions.
And I've often kind of halfway joked with the team that I'm sure there's a department of department of Homeland Security file on me based on all of the search language that was put in there.
(30:15):
From from early Native Americans in slave trade all the way through Ukraine. It's it's dark stuff by design.
But it's there. It's, you know, it's there for a reason. It's there to show that we're all capable of this.
Again, regardless of background or ethnicity, we're all capable of these kinds of acts are the temptation to commit these kinds of acts.
(30:38):
But we're all also capable of the other end of the spectrum, which is the aesthetic side. I will also say though that it's one of the most exciting parts of filmmaking for me as a director.
And I know Tim shares that I'm feeling is that you're, you know, it's an exhaustive and painstaking search for the right images, whether it's dark images or just images to help tell the story.
(31:06):
And it's it's so exciting, you know, building this visual tapestry and to support your narrative.
It's really exciting and it's it's also a journey of discovery because you, you know, you need a shot here of Nuremberg and you know, start looking and, you know, it's not until you find it.
(31:27):
You maybe find 10 shots and you go, oh, that's the one. So it's a really it's a really fun and exciting process and it's an exhausting one.
But it's it's also very inspiring. I it's one of the parts of documentary filmmaking that I love the best is that you're really pulling from all these different sources, whether it's filming of a live event or an interview to still photographs to news footage to magazine clips to video footage.
(31:55):
You know, it's it's it's endless and then figuring a way to weave that all together so that it works cohesively. It's a very exciting process.
I love that you also bring the narrative of the film to life with incredible interviews and commentary from academics like Timothy Snyder, Neil de Grasse Tyson.
(32:20):
And I mean an incredible interview with Ben Forens, who prosecuted Nazis in the Nuremberg Warcrime trials in the late 40s.
What in your opinion do these interviews and their commentary add to the film?
Well, they give you context from a historical point of view. Certainly because we did a very intentional job of weaving between the intimate and emotional and the more detached academic high level historical review of it.
(32:56):
But Michael Barronbaum for instance, was was was a big inspiration for the second person description of experience when when he was describing.
I believe it was the day after we documented the Auschwitz tour. We sat in a in a little enclave and crack down both Mark and I were there.
And the way he is able to describe a day in the life of an Auschwitz prisoner and what it's like to go through every step of the chain from you know arrival to incineration frankly and all the the dehumanizing and sadistic things that happened you in between.
(33:36):
He would always describe that as you you you know all your possessions are taken. You're led into a shower you're told to hang up your clothes on a hook you you you you.
And but the Snyder and some of these other folks we we knew we needed a little more I'd read a lot of Timothy Snyder's writings and we knew we needed some more.
(34:02):
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(34:22):
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(34:44):
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(35:06):
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(35:28):
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(35:50):
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(36:12):
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(36:34):
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(36:56):
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(37:18):
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(37:40):
And so I think that's the way it was.
And so many ways on top of the emotional element of the ride.
Yeah, you mentioned education earlier.
What I meant to add on to that is education is Ben Friends used to talk about this.
There's like three pillars for the stool of avoiding genocide.
There's law, international law.
(38:02):
There's education and memorialization.
And the other one is you got to make people care.
And you get to know your knowledge alone, academia courses, museums, they can make you interested and they can bring you in.
But they can only bring you so far.
You have to, as Mother Teresa, but you have to associate with the one.
(38:24):
When you think of the many, you do nothing.
But when you think of the one, then you begin to embody that experience that they went through.
And in the back half of the film, we make that point quite, quite stridently that you cannot change the mind until the hardest change.
That's another element of the film I did love is like the Mother Teresa saying that you put up a lot of great quotes throughout the film as well.
(38:50):
That I think are impactful for the story you're telling.
Well, that's again going back to the point of this tapestry.
Quotes were just another element that could help tell the story and make a point.
And Tim's knowledge of history was really valuable there where he was able to pull out some great ones.
(39:14):
I think it really helps the narrative and really allows the viewer to really be a part of the story and not feel like they're being preached to but feel like they're learning along as they go.
And we were very, very deliberate on that.
How we established the pacing and the weaving together of the different stories and incorporating these other genocides as well.
(39:41):
And I think both Tim and I and Lisa and the rest of our team were very happy with the outcome.
Well, the film has played at a number of festivals, a number one really very important one in the Hague.
Tim, will you tell us about that?
(40:02):
I went, I honored the family that hid my family during the war and we honored them at the Israeli consulate in the Hague.
Oh, wow. That's fascinating. I mean, that's terrific.
Here's the deal with the Hague. The festival, international festival at the Hague is the shortest festival of all the festivals.
(40:25):
It's literally two very important events in the Netherlands. So we are an official selection and they then they go to the next round of finalists to see whether you actually screen.
And then you go to another round after that to see if you screen with a conversation.
So we, I don't know that we're going to make it to the final final stage of that, but we're honored to be in consideration and in a festival like that.
(40:56):
And a lot of the other festivals that were entered and we're waiting here back on now are very much human rights focused festivals.
I've talked about social justice and in common humanity and a lot of these have cropped up within the last several years and I'll take any of those over a Sunday and any day of the week because it's really it's filmmaking and storytelling with great intent and purpose.
(41:19):
And I think right now, I mean, this very moment in history, maybe even the last 24 hours.
There's nothing more important than emphasizing common humanity because we've been through we've been through a pretty long stretch right now where dehumanization is a brand.
It's one it was a campaign brand and and it's quite possible in the next year, two years, three years.
(41:46):
We're going to have to answer that question that Stephen Smith posed if someone's strangers knocking on your door in the middle of the night and someone's trying to take them away.
Are you going to risk your own life to help them?
And I'm not a big pro cruelty guy.
So I would tell you first and foremost right now, I would stand up, but it's scary.
(42:07):
It's scary.
It is very scary.
I think back to your class, like this film is so perfect for the class that you took in college.
Good point. I'll have to go to the university.
It really is.
This weekend, you have a film festival, the Fort Lauderdale International Film Festival screening on Sunday November 10th, correct?
(42:29):
Correct.
2pm.
And are you doing a Q&A after?
Yeah, Mark's not making this one. This one will be Lisa and I.
Oh, okay.
We will be dividing the anchor.
The link is up down below on YouTube.
I know some viewers were asking where they can see it. They should go to for the living movie dot com because you'll have it up when the film is released and where people can see it.
(42:56):
On the website for the living movie dot com.
There's a page with all the festivals and a link where you can buy tickets.
There's the trailer, the synopsis, the crew. There's a ton of information, all the press.
This will be up there eventually, this chat.
(43:18):
So yeah, that is the best source for finding out where the film is playing, when it will be distributed, etc.
I just want to say, if you're in a situation right now as an American citizen and you're looking around you and you're wondering,
where's the empathy gone? What is it about us as a people?
It has caused that that innate human mechanism to break down.
(43:43):
This is a film you need to see because we get into the roots of that, but we also get into the other side, which is
at least a conversation that might get us to a solution.
Our discourse has really, really gotten ugly, uglier than ugly, and not only dehumanizing, but there's genocide of language used on social media all the time now.
(44:04):
Some of it involves conflicts overseas and some of it is just human beings being our own American citizens.
Yeah, and it's bad stuff, but it's not normal.
Ben Forens, at 103, just passed away, one of the most important quotes from him in our film is that, you know,
(44:25):
out of everything he's seen, standing up to not season a courtroom in Nuremberg, and then the rise of fall of communism and genocide after genocide leading up to the 2000s.
He said the era we're living, the era we're living through right now is the most dangerous he's ever seen.
So that's, that tells me a lot, tells me that my gut is right about it, but it also, I have great reverence for that man and his perspective on history.
(44:52):
I mean, he's seen it all at 103.
Yes.
Living through that period of time.
Gentlemen, thank you for making this movie.
Thank you for spending this time with me to talk about it.
Really congratulations.
Thank you.
Thank you so much.
Thank you, Alan, and thanks for having us.
(45:13):
My pleasure. Good luck with all the festivals and the Fort Lauderdale International is November 10th, and the link is up on YouTube down below.
Have a great evening, gents.
See you all there.
Good night.
Thanks everybody for watching.
Again, thank you to Mark Bennett and Tim Roper for being here to discuss this powerful new documentary for more information.
(45:37):
Remember, for the LivingMovie.com.
As I leave you remember, we all have choices to make in life.
Speak up, do the hard thing, and let's all fight hate for good.
I truly believe conversations like this can change the world around us.
War, hate is not the answer. Feel free to share this episode with your friends and family.
(45:59):
Until the next conversation, please stay safe.
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