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and supports the Jews in observing their Sabbath. Over the course of the next seven
months, Schindler uses his wealth to bribe Nazi officials and purchase shell cas-
ings from outside businesses in order to ensure that his own factory does not
contribute to the Nazi war effort. Schindler runs through his entire fortune in
May 1945, just as Germany surrenders. As a registered member of the Nazi Party
and war profiteer, Schindler is forced to run from the Red Army. The SS soldiers
guarding Schindler’s factory are tasked with exterminating the Jewish workforce,
but Schindler appeals to their humanity and persuades them to keep the workers
alive. He then bids farewell to his employees and prepares to head west, with the
aim of surrendering to the Americans. The factory employees pres ent Schindler
with a signed statement confirming his part in saving Jewish lives during the Holo-
caust and give him a ring engraved with a Talmudic quotation: “Whoever saves
one life saves the world entire.” When the workers awaken the next morning, a
Soviet soldier arrives and tells them that they are free. Stunned, the Jewish fac-
tory workers leave their place of refuge and move to a nearby town. Final scenes
depict Göth’s execution [13 September 1946] and summarize Schindler’s remain-
ing years after the war. An epilogue shows Schindler’s actual workers, side by
side with the actors who portrayed them, placing stones on Schindler’s grave— a
Jewish act of reverence for the dead. In the final shot, Neeson places a pair of
roses on the grave.
Reception
As befitting its cultural status as a major cinematic statement on the Holocaust,
Schindler’s List had four successive North American premieres: one in Washington,
D.C., on 30 November 1993, another in New York City on 1 December; a third
in Los Angeles on 9 December; and a fourth in Toronto on 15 December 1993.
Theater openings were gradually ramped up in the United States, peaking in the
film’s 14th week toward the end of March 1994, with its widest release in 1,389
theaters and highest weekly gross $8.2 million (18–24 March 1994). Ultimately,
Schindler’s List remained in American theaters for eight months. By the time it
closed out on 28 July 1994, the film had grossed $96 million in the United
States. The foreign total amounted to $225 million, for a grand total of $321 mil-
lion, versus a modest $23 million production bud get. Given its exceedingly grim
subject matter, Spielberg feared the movie would flop, but it turned out to be a major
box office success. Schindler’s List also earned a dozen Oscar nominations and won
seven Oscars for Best Picture, Best Director (Spielberg’s first Oscar), Best Screenplay,
Best Cinematography, Best Editing, Best Original Score, and Best Art Direction. It
also won four Golden Globes, nine BAFTAs, and numerous other international film
awards. Reviews were almost uniformly approving in the highest terms, and other
film directors— Robert Altman, Billy Wilder, Roman Polanski— lavished praise on
Spielberg publicly and privately. There were, however, some dissenting opinions.
His thunder stolen by Spielberg, a disgruntled Stanley Kubrick was forced to aban-
don his own Holocaust proj ect. When scriptwriter Frederic Raphael suggested that
Schindler’s List was a fine repre sen ta tion of the Holocaust, Kubrick retorted, “Think
that’s about the Holocaust? That was about success, wasn’t it? The Holocaust is about
6 million people who get killed. Schindler’s List is about 600 [sic] who don’t” (Raphael,