Shanghai Ghetto

Even those well-versed in Holocaust history may be enlightened by Dana Janklowicz-Mann and Amir Mann's documentary Shanghai Ghetto, which expertly narrates a largely overlooked episode in the tragic Jewish experience during World War II: the emigration of some 20,000 to relative safety in the titular Chinese port where, due to the circumstances of Japanese occupation, refugees could enter without visas at a time when other nations were slamming their doors shut. The powerful story of how the community survived even in the wake of Pearl Harbor, which meant internment for their British and American sponsors, is related as well as that of their oppressed Chinese hosts, whose greater poverty and suffering adds to the poignancy. Combining stock newsreel footage to set the stage, interviews with survivors and historians, and archival material--excerpts from documents and still photos of the period--the documentary also includes moving contemporary scenes of the participants returning to Shanghai and revisiting the tiny, cramped rooms shared with their families so many years ago. Shanghai Ghetto's strength lies not in any cinematic razzle-dazzle (from a technical standpoint, the film is thoroughly conventional), but rather in its emotional resurrection of an historical episode that, in the telling, proves to be simultaneously harrowing and uplifting. DVD extras include a filmmaker commentary track and deleted interviews. Recommended. Aud: C, P. (F. Swietek)