SCHINDLER'S LIST [1993]

Whoever Saves One Life, 

Saves The World Entire

Itzhak: By law, I have to tell you, Sir, I'm a Jew.
Oskar: Well, I'm a German. So there we are.

Investor I: Not good enough.
Investor II: It's not good enough.
Oskar: Not good enough? 
Look where you're living, look where you've been put.
'Not good enough'.
A couple of months ago you'd be right, not anymore.
Investor I: Money's still money.
Oskar: No, it's not. That's why we're here.
Trade goods, that's the only currency that'll be worth anything in the ghetto.
Things have changed, my friend.

Oskar: My father was fond of saying, 

'You need 3 things in life; a good doctor, a forgiving priest, and a clever accountant'.

The first two, I've never had much use for.

But the third...

[raise a glass to Itzhak while he look to Oskar in confuse]

Just pretend, for Christ's sake.

Itzhak: Is that all?

Oskar: I'm trying to thank you.

I'm saying, I couldn't have done this without you.

Oskar: Take a guess, how many people are on my payroll.

My father, at the height of his success, had 50. I've got 350.

350 workers on the factory floor with one purpose.

Emilie: To make pots and pans?

Oskar: To make money, for me.

They won't soon forget the name Schindler here, I can tell you that.

'Oskar Schindler', they'll say.

'Everybody remembers him. 

He did something extraordinary.

He did something no one else did.

He came here with nothing, a suitcase, and built a bankrupt company into a major manufactory.

And left with a steamer trunk, 2 steamer trunks full of money.

All the riches in the world'.

~Oskar Schindler

Oskar: There's no way I could have known this before, but there was always something missing.

In every business I tried, I can see now, it wasn't me that failed.

Something was missing.

Even if I'd known what it was, there's nothing I've couldn't done about it,

because you can't create this thing.

And it makes all the difference in the world between success and failure.

Emilie: Luck?

Oskar: War.

Today is history. Today will be remembered.

Years from now, the young will ask with wonder about this day.

Today is history and you are part of it.

600 years ago, when elsewhere they were footing the blame for The Black Death, 

Kazimierz The Great... so-called, told the Jews they could come to Krakow.

They came.

They trundled their belongings into the city.

They settled.

They took hold.

They prospered in business, science, education, the arts.

They came here with nothing. Nothing!

And they flourished.

For 6 centuries there has been a Jewish Krakow.

Think about that.

By this evening, those 6 centuries are a rumor.

They never happened.

Today is history.

~Amon Goeth

Oskar: What are you doing?

Itzhak, scratching his head: What? Scratching my head.

Makes them think we have lice.

Helps make them keep their distance.

Oskar: So, what can I do for you?

Regina: They say that no one dies here.

They say your factory is a haven

They say you are good.

Oskar: Who says that?

Regina: Everyone.

Oskar: People die. It's a fact of life.

He wants to kill everybody? Great!

What am I supposed to do about it? Bring everybody over?

Is that what you think?

Send them over to Schindler, send them all!

His place is a haven, didn't you know?

It's not a factory. It's not an enterprise of any kind.

It's a haven for rabbis and orphans and people with no skills whatsoever!

You think I don't know what you're doing?

You're so quiet all the time.

I know, I know!

Itzhak: Are you losing money?

Oskar: That's not the point!

Itzhak: So the point is...

Oskar: It's dangerous! It's dangerous to me!

Bejski told me the other day, somebosy escaped from a work detail outside the wire.

Goeth lined up everybody from the missing man's barracks.

He shot the man to the left of Bejski, the man to the right of him.

He walked down the line shooting every other man with a pistol.

25.

~Itzhak Stern

Helen: My first day here, he beat me because I threw out the bones from dinner.

He came down to the basement at midnight, and he... he asked where they were.

For his dogs, you understand.

I said to him, I don't know how I say this,

I never could say it now, I said to him, 'Why are you beating me?'

He said, 'The reason I beat you now is because you ask why I beat you.'

Oskar: I know your sufferings, Helen.

Helen: It doesn't matter. I have accepted them.

Oskar: Accepted them?

Helen: One day, he will shoot me.

Oskar: No, he won't shoot you.

Helen: I know. I see things.

We were on the roof on Monday, young Lisiek and I,

and we saw The Herr Kommandant come out from the front door and down the steps by the patio,

right there below us.

And there on the steps he drew his gun and he shot a woman who was passing by.

A woman carrying a bundle. Through the throat.

Just a woman on her way somewhere, you know?

She was no fatter or thinner or slower or faster than anyone else,

and I couldn't guess what had she done.

The more you see of The Herr Kommandant, the more you see there is no set rules you can live by.

You can't say to yourself, 'If I follow these rules, I will be safe.'

Oskar: He won't shoot you because he enjoys you too much.

He enjoys you so much he won't even let you wear the star.

He doesn't want anyone else to know it's a Jew he's enjoying.

He shot the woman from the steps because she meant nothing to him.

She was one of a series, neither offending or pleasing him.

Amon: Control is power. That's power.

Oskar: Is that why they fear us?

Amon: We have the fucking power to kill, that's why they fear us.

Oskar: They fear us because we have the power to kill arbitrarily.

A man commits a crime, he should know better.

We have him killed, and we feel pretty good about it.

Or we kill him ourselves and we feel even better.

That's not power, though. That's justice.

It's different than power.

Power is when we have every justification to kill, and we don't.

Amon: You think that's power?

Oskar: That what the emperor's had.

A man stole something, he's brought him before the emperor,

he throws himself down on the ground, he begs for mercy.

He knows he's going to die.

And the emperor pardons him.

This worthless man.

He lets him go.

That's power, Amon... That is power.

The truth, Helen, is always the right answer.

~Amon Goeth

The trains arrived and the people were driven out with clubs.

The were lined up in front of 2 big warehouses.

One was marked 'Cloak Room' and the other 'Valuables'.

And there they were made to undress.

A Jewish boy handed them pieces of string to tie their shoes together.

Thay shaved their hair.

They told them it was needed to make something special for U-boat crews.

And then they were herded down a big corridor to bunkers with Stars of David on the doors

and signs that said 'Bath and Inhalation Room'.

SS gave them soap.

They told them to breath all the time because it's good for disinfecting.

And then they gassed them.

~Mila Pfefferberg

They cast a spell on you, you know, the Jews.

When you work closely with them, like I do, you see this.

They have this power.

It's like a virus.

Some of my men are infected with this virus.

They should be pitied, not punished.

They should receive treatment.

This is as real as typhus.

I see this all the time.

~Amon Goeth

Amon: I don't understand. You want these people?

Oskar: 'These people'? My people! I want my people!

Amon: Who are you? Moses?

The list is an absolute good.

The list is life.

All around its margins lies the gulf.

~Itzhak Stern

Oskar: If I win, the girl goes on my list.

Amon: I can't wager Helen in a carol game.

Oskar: Why not?

Amon: Wouldn't be right.

Oskar: She's just going to Auschwitz Number 2, anyway.

What difference does it make?

Amon: She's not going to Auschwitz. I'd never do that to her.

No. I want her to come back to Vienna with me.

I want her to come to work for me there.

I want to grow old with her.

Oskar: Are you mad? Amon, you can't take her to Vienna with you.

Amon: No, of course I can't.

That's what I'd like to do.

What I can do, if I'm any sort of a man, is the next most merciful thing,

I shall take her into the woods and shoot her painlessly in the back of the head.

Under Department W provisions, it is unlawful to kill a worker without just cause.

Under The Business Compensation Fund, I am entitled to file damage claims for such deaths.

If you shoot without thinking, you got to prison, I get paid.

That's how it works.

So, there will be no summary executions here.

There will be no interference of any kind with production.

In hopes of ensuring that, guards will no longer be allowed on the factory floor without my authorization.

[to SS Officer] For your cooperation, you have my gratitude.

~Oskar Schindler

The unconditional surrender of Germany has just been announced.

At  midnight tonight, the war is over.

Tomorrow, you'll begin the process of looking for survivors of your families.

In most cases, you won't find them.

After 6 long years of murder, victims are being mourned throughout the world.

We've survived.

Many of you have come up to me and thanked me.

Thank yourselves.

Thank your fearless Stern and others among you who worried about you

and faced death at every moment.

I'm a member of the Nazi Party.

I'm a munitions manufacturer.

I'm a profiteer of slave labor.

I'm a criminal.

At midnight you'll be free, and I'll be hunted.

I shall remain with you until 5 minutes after midnight, after which time, 

and I hope you'll forgive me, I have to flee.

[to the SS soldiers]

I know you have received orders from our commandant, 

which he has received from his superiors to dispose of the population of this camp.

Now would be the time to do it.

Here they are, they're all here.

This is your opportunity.

Or you could leave and return to your families as men instead of murderers.

~Oskar Schindler

It is Hebrew, from the Talmud.

It says, 'Whoever saves one life, saves the world entire.'

~Itzhak Stern

Oskar, sobbing: I could have got more out. I could have got more.

I don't know, if I could...

Itzhak: Oskar, there are 1,100 people who are alive because of you. Look at them!

Oskar, still sobbing: If I'd made more money...

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