Jan Wiener and Arnost Lustig are survivors of the Holocaust. The two Czech friends survived two very different experiences during the war. Lustig is a writer who became a communist after the war. Wiener had a far more difficult struggle. He was a fighter. This documentary retraces Wiener's steps during and after the war in a journey that will stretch his friendship with Lustig to the breaking point. The writer and the fighter provide an interesting insight into the personal dynamics rooted in the horror of war.
Wiener's father taught him to fight at a young age. Discrimination was rampant long before the war set in. As a young Czech, Wiener was not one to stand idly while being taunted. His father taught him to ask again what name he had been called. And if the boy repeated it, Wiener would punch him. This fiery spirit and self-determination set Wiener on a very different path than Lustig, who conformed with the communists after the war. Wiener provides insight into his inner fire with a story he related about obtaining his exit Visa. He was treated disrespectfully by the Czech bureaucrat, making Wiener burn with revenge throughout the war. He was driven to return after the war, determined to kill this man. He later relented when the man begged for his life. But getting to that point interrupts a long saga fraught with danger and sorrow.
Wiener's mother was taken to the camps. His parents had divorced, so his father was living in a distant region. Wiener made his escape, visiting with his father en route. Wiener wanted his father to join him, but attended his suicide instead. It was a suicide that his father likely chose rather than slowing down his son in hopes that the young man would survive. Wiener realizes later in life that is was a selfless act that allowed his father to die with a modicum of dignity, while freeing him to travel lightly. Wiener rides beneath a train on the coil springs beneath the toilet outlet until he arrives in Italy. In Italy, he is imprisoned for several months, ending up at a work camp, where he escapes. He works his way to the Allied lines and ends up in London, serving in the armed forces as a pilot. After the war, Wiener returns to Czechoslovakia, where he and other pilots are under constant scrutiny from the Communist government. His mistreatment includes beatings and imprisonment at the hands of the same Communist Party served by his friend, Lustig. The memories of this experience drives a wedge between the friends as they each call into question the motivations and recollections of the other.
Lustig was also sent to the camps during World War II. They revisit the camp where Lustig felt pride in his work on the railroad. He is asked where the railroad leads, to which he responds "Auschwitz." The irony is not lost on Lustig, who describes his own myopic vision while building the railroad upon which so many Jews would be sent to their deaths. For him, it was a place of survival. Later, his railroad became the oppressive Communist Party. Wiener is troubled by Lustig's association with the party and challenges him about belonging to a group that tortured its own citizens. Lustig claims he quit the party when he learned that they had created their own "camps" and places of torture. While Lustig continued to write, Wiener obtained asylum in the United States. Lustig arrived later and the two eventually became friends. We watch as that friendship slowly unwinds on a journey of painful remembrance.
Director Amir Bar-Lev does not overtly insert himself into this story. Many documentaries end up with a point-of-view heavily influenced by the Director. Bar-Lev allows this story to be told by the participants. The writer and the fighter. What results is a sometimes comical and always candid look into a fragile friendship and two very different histories with a common point of origin. The dichotomy of the two stories sets up an interesting and gripping examination of how the war affected people and the depth of the scars that originated in that dark period. The wounds are exposed in a way that feels intimate and never exploitive. As viewers, we are treated to a very personal recollection of experiences that, in the end, feels rewarding, informative and intimate. I highly recommend The Fighter with 8/10.
The full film is available on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OmTuvV4fwPk
