Killing Kasztner

Killing Kasztner, subtitled The Jew who Dealt with Nazis, offers an illuminating perspective on the most important war in history. This documentary from filmmaker Gaylen Ross revolves around Rezso Kasztner and his efforts to save Hungarian Jews during WWII. The story continues after the war offering the view that 1950s Israel was not unlike McCarthy skewed America as Kasztner, now a government official, is accused of being a Nazi collaborator and goes on trial.
Kasztner was assassinated in Tel Aviv in 1957 but the story continues after that as people who were among those saved by his actions provide a testament. Ross finds some of these survivors and eventually interviews the man who over 50-years ago as a young right wing radical killed Kasztner. This is perhaps the most gripping part of the film as he recounts the shooting at the spot where it happened. Vintage newsreel and archival clips help paint the reality of black and white times.
While this doc concerns Jewish themes the larger picture has uncanny parallels with our own current status in the world. If a person (Kasztner) had to bribe Adolf Eichmann (and you had to deal with Eichmann personally - this is not a negotiation that can handled by some lieutenant) with money and war supplies to free people who would otherwise be shipped to death camps how is that any different than our own CIA dealing with people during the Afghan-Russian war in the 1980s that 20-years later would be deemed enemy terrorists? In other words, war involves having to deal with the devil, and even a person of the highest morals is tainted by mere association.
Killing Kasztner shows plainly how the honor of one generation can be twisted out of perspective so easily by the next. Killing Kastner opens exclusively for a limited run at the Angelika on Friday. Additionally next month (March 9—21) the MFAH (also the Jewish Community Center and the Holocaust Museum) will run several Jewish themed or related films. Among them is Flame & Citron a brilliant Danish film that depicts the strange alliance and double crosses between the Allied Underground and Nazis and collaborators.