Schindler’s List Passage

Step through the gate in front to enter the passage where one of the most powerful scenes from Schindler’s List was filmed. The movie is based on the real and tragic events surrounding the Podgórze ghetto. If you’ve watched it, you’ll recognise this as the spot where belongings were thrown out during the liquidation of the ghetto. You might be wondering why Spielberg filmed in the Jewish quarter of Kazimierz instead of in Podgórze itself. By the 1990s, Podgórze had been completely destroyed and rebuilt with modern buildings, whereas Kazimierz retained these small inner courtyards typical of old Jewish neighbourhoods in Poland. Look closely, and you’ll spot the staircase where the aunt of the little girl in the red coat hides during a police raid. If you haven’t read the book or seen the movie, here’s a quick summary: it tells the story of Oskar Schindler, a businessman and member of the Nazi party who comes to Kraków to profit from the war and build his fortune. He opens a factory, and his business thrives thanks to the cheap Jewish labour he employs. Everything changes when he witnesses the brutal liquidation of the Kraków ghetto. He becomes fully aware of the horrors carried out by his regime. From then on, Schindler made it his mission to save as many lives as he could. He draws up a list of 1,100 people whose work is supposedly vital to the German war effort. At the end of the war, Schindler and his wife flee, as they’re wanted by the Allies as war criminals — but not before saying goodbye to the 1,100 people they saved. In return, the workers gave them a ring engraved with this line from the Talmud: “He who saves one life, saves the entire world.”