''Inheritance'' is a 2006 American

documentary film A documentary film or documentary is a non-fictional film, motion-picture intended to "document reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction, education or maintaining a Recorded history, historical record". Bill Nichols (film critic), Bil ...

about , also known as Monika Christiane Knauss, the daughter of and

Amon Göth Amon Leopold Göth (; alternative spelling ''Goeth''; 11 December 1908 – 13 September 1946) was an Austrian SS functionary and war criminal. He served as the commandant of the Kraków-Płaszów concentration camp in Płaszów in German ...

, commandant of the Płaszów concentration camp. Monika Hertwig was 10 months old when her father was hanged in 1946 for war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide. She discovered the truth about him only as a young adult, because her own mother told her in childhood that he was a good man and a war hero. The film centers around her meeting a

Holocaust The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; a ...

survivor, Helen Jonas-Rosenzweig, who was interned at Płaszów and personally knew Göth. The film was produced for

PBS The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcasting, public broadcaster and Non-commercial activity, non-commercial, Terrestrial television, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly fu ...

James Moll James Moll is an American director and producer of film documentaries and television documentaries. His documentary work has earned him an Academy Award, two Emmys, and a Grammy. Moll's production company, Allentown Productions Inc., has been ...

film director A film director controls a film's artistic and dramatic aspects and visualizes the screenplay (or script) while guiding the film crew and actors in the fulfilment of that vision. The director has a key role in choosing the cast members, p ...

, documentary producer and the Founding Executive Director of the USC Shoah Foundation Institute focusing on testimonies of the

Holocaust survivors Holocaust survivors are people who survived the Holocaust, defined as the persecution and attempted annihilation of the Jews by Nazi Germany and Axis powers, its allies before and during World War II in Europe and North Africa. There is no unive ...

. In 2009, ''Inheritance'' was nominated by the

National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences The National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (NATAS) is an American professional service organization founded in 1955 for "the advancement of the arts and sciences of television and the promotion of creative leadership for artistic, edu ...

and received an

Emmy Award The Emmy Awards, or Emmys, are an extensive range of awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international television industry. A number of annual Emmy Award ceremonies are held throughout the calendar year, each with the ...

in the category of Outstanding Interview.

Synopsis

In the documentary, travels to Płaszów on the outskirts of

Kraków Kraków (), or Cracow, is the second-largest and one of the oldest cities in Poland. Situated on the Vistula River in Lesser Poland Voivodeship, the city dates back to the seventh century. Kraków was the official capital of Poland until 1596 ...

, Poland in an attempt to learn more about her father, SS-

Hauptsturmführer __NOTOC__ (, ; short: ''Hstuf'') was a Nazi Party paramilitary rank that was used in several Nazi organizations such as the SS, NSKK and the NSFK. The rank of ''Hauptsturmführer'' was a mid-level commander and had equivalent seniority to a ...

Amon Göth, who was portrayed in Steven Spielberg's 1993 film ''

Schindler's List ''Schindler's List'' is a 1993 American epic historical drama film directed and produced by Steven Spielberg and written by Steven Zaillian. It is based on the 1982 novel ''Schindler's Ark'' by Australian novelist Thomas Keneally. The film fo ...

'' by British actor,

Ralph Fiennes Ralph Nathaniel Twisleton-Wykeham-Fiennes ( ; born 22 December 1962) is an English actor, film producer, and director. A Shakespeare interpreter, he excelled onstage at the Royal National Theatre before having further success at the Royal Shak ...

. The film had deeply affected Monika, and she claims to have hated Spielberg after watching it. In her search for more information, Hertwig has a meeting at the scene of the former

concentration camp Internment is the imprisonment of people, commonly in large groups, without charges or intent to file charges. The term is especially used for the confinement "of enemy citizens in wartime or of terrorism suspects". Thus, while it can simply ...

with Helen Jonas-Rosenzweig, a Holocaust survivor born in

, who was interned at Płaszów, and was forced to work as a maid for Amon Göth. She survived the Holocaust with the help of German businessman

Oskar Schindler Oskar Schindler (; 28 April 1908 – 9 October 1974) was a German industrialist, humanitarian and a member of the Nazi Party who is credited with saving the lives of 1,200 Jews during the Holocaust by employing them in his enamelware and amm ...

. More than 60 years after Göth’s execution for war crimes, the two women first met there in person. Amon Göth had two Jewish housemaids who stayed with him in the villa: Helen ("Lena") Hirsch (now Helen Horowitz, living in Israel) and Helen ("Susanna") Sternlicht (now Helen Jonas-Rosenzweig, living in the United States). As part of Monika Hertwig's search for more answers, she was given the opportunity to meet the woman from the

Kraków Ghetto The Kraków Ghetto was one of five major metropolitan Nazi ghettos created by Germany in the new General Government territory during the German occupation of Poland in World War II. It was established for the purpose of exploitation, terror, and ...

enslaved and preyed upon by her father during

the Holocaust in Poland The Holocaust in Poland was part of the European-wide Holocaust organized by Nazi Germany and took place in German-occupied Poland. During the genocide, three million Polish Jews were murdered, half of all Jews murdered during the Holocaust. ...

.Allentown Productions Retrieved April 2, 2013. Göth abused Helen and shot her boyfriend, a Jewish boy named Adam, dead in front of her. Göth was a married man, with a wife Anni, and two children in Vienna, when he met Monika's mother – a beautician and aspiring actress originally from

Gliwice Gliwice (; german: Gleiwitz) is a city in Upper Silesia, in southern Poland. The city is located in the Silesian Highlands, on the Kłodnica river (a tributary of the Oder). It lies approximately 25 km west from Katowice, the regional cap ...

(or

Wrocław Wrocław (; german: Breslau, or . ; Silesian German: ''Brassel'') is a city in southwestern Poland and the largest city in the historical region of Silesia. It lies on the banks of the River Oder in the Silesian Lowlands of Central Europe, rou ...

, sources vary) – through his friend Oskar Schindler in Kraków in 1942 (or early in 1943). She worked as secretary at Schindler's

factory A factory, manufacturing plant or a production plant is an industrial facility, often a complex consisting of several buildings filled with machinery, where workers manufacture items or operate machines which process each item into another. T ...

at that time. The two had an ostentatious camp affair which Göth's Austrian wife knew nothing about. They partied, played tennis and rode horseback together. Ruth saw him hunting humans (in fact, he killed hundreds), but in a 1983 interview with the BBC she attempted to defend him nevertheless. During this interview, she was shown the transcripts of his war crimes trial. She was dying of

emphysema Emphysema, or pulmonary emphysema, is a lower respiratory tract disease, characterised by air-filled spaces ( pneumatoses) in the lungs, that can vary in size and may be very large. The spaces are caused by the breakdown of the walls of the alve ...

and committed suicide a day later. Monika, who was 37 years old at the time of the interview, thus first heard her mother speak frankly on the subject of her father, to total strangers. Monika Hertwig, Göth's illegitimate child, and his camp maid Helen Jonas-Rosenzweig, met for the first time in 2004. Hertwig had requested the meeting with Jonas, but Jonas was hesitant because her memories of the past were so traumatic. She eventually agreed after Hertwig wrote to her: "We have to do it for the murdered people." Jonas shared her sentiment and offered to meet at the Płaszów Memorial Monument in Poland and tour Göth's villa with her for the documentary ''Inheritance''; her husband had committed suicide in 1980 suffering from

survivor's guilt Survivor guilt (or survivor's guilt; also called survivor syndrome or survivor's syndrome and survivor disorder or survivor's disorder) is a mental condition that occurs when a person believes they have done something wrong by surviving a traumati ...

. James Moll, the film's director, brought the women together in front of a camera in order to make his film.

Release

''Inheritance'' was completed in 2006. It was produced by James Moll's company Allentown Productions. The primary footage was shot over the course of 13 days on location in Poland, but footage was also shot at Helen's home in New Jersey and on the outskirts of Munich, where Monika lived. The film premiered on June 25, 2006 at the

Los Angeles Film Festival The LA Film Festival was an annual film festival that was held in Los Angeles, California, and usually took place in June. It showcased independent, international, feature, documentary and short films, as well as web series, music videos, episod ...

and was shown internationally as ''Der Mördervater'' in Germany, as ''Förintelsens arv'' in Sweden, and as ''My Father was a Nazi Commandant'' (TV title) in the UK.

Critical response

The documentary received critical acclaim and positive reviews from a number of critics, including David Cornelius of ''DVD Review'' ("simple but stunning documentary"), William Lee of ''DVD Verdict'' ("a remarkable story"), Professor Cynthia Fuchs at ''PopMatters'' ("they live with the past, each moment a lesson"), and Michael Atkinson of ''IFC'' ("a fascinating dialectic for a number of reasons").

Production notes

James Moll said in production notes that he first came in contact with Monika Hertwig in 2003 only to ask her permission to use photographs of Amon Göth for a separate project connected with ''Schindler’s List'' video release. He expected the worst but changed his attitude upon hearing her speak. One of her statements became the genesis of ''Inheritance'' for him. "I am not my father" she said. Around the same time, Moll was introduced to Helen Jonas-Rosenzweig through Shoah Foundation of the University of Southern California.

References

External links