Zookeeper's Wife
The movie is basically the story of the couple running the Warsaw zoo and what they went through in WW-2. The film does a good job of ratcheting up the tension as the Germans invade and the predictable killing of most of the animals occurs. To keep the zoo somewhat in operation the zoologist in charge offers to farm pigs for the German Army. At the same time there is a tension filled situation between the couple and Dr. Hecht, a top zoologist in Germany who offers to help by relocating the best stock to Berlin. He clearly has romantic desires on the zookeeper's wife. To feed the pigs the Polish zookeeper has to drive to the Jewish Ghetto to pick up garbage. This ultimately results in contacts which develop into an Underground Railroad to smuggle Jews out of the ghetto. I found it a stressful film to watch, well done though, filmed in Czech Republic, less military history than I had hoped for. It gives you the idea that the Germans were in Warsaw in couple of days, in reality it was quick enough; it took only 36 days. Airplanes doing bombing are shown briefly as shadows, or just noise.
The rising of the Home Army is depicted but there is no reference to the deliberate halt of the Soviet Army which allowed the Germans to kill off most of the Poles loyal to the Free Polish Government in exile. Once the war is over no mention is made of the decades of communist rule the Poles then suffered under. It's not a classic "war movie" but it does show a fascinating part of the history of the Holocaust, also though overlooking the complicity of many non Jewish poles in facilitating the Holocaust in Poland.
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