8 Documentaries Which Will Change The Way You See The World

7. Shoah

Ten years after Triumph of the Will lured the German people into supporting fascism, the true horrors of the Nazi regime were being carried out in the concentration camps littered throughout occupied Europe. If World War 2 was the dark stain marking the 20th century, the Holocaust was its ultimate shame. Made in 1985, Claude Lanzmann's Shoah is perhaps the most thorough €“ and shocking €“ study of the Holocaust, with copious interviews complimented by visits to extermination camps found throughout Poland €“ at over 9 hours running time it is also a documentary which requires considerable stamina to get through, not least because of the harrowing nature of the subject matter. Shoah is not without its controversies, primarily the backlash against a perceived broad indictment of the Polish people and their complicity in the Holocaust and its focus on Jewish suffering at the exclusion of the millions of non-Jewish Poles who also suffered, as well as the brave people who helped Jews escape the death camps. But nevertheless, as a portrait of the Holocaust and a meticulous catalogue of eyewitness testimonies it remains essential viewing for anyone wishing to cast a light into one of the darkest recesses of human history.