STEAL A PENCIL FOR ME FACTS

This documentary tells a daring tale of love and romance set in a Nazi concentration camp. In Holland in 1943, Jack Polak was stuck in a loveless marriage and became smitten by the beautiful Ina Soep, the daughter of a wealthy diamond magnate. Soon, all three of them were whisked to a concentration camp and forced to live in the same barracks. Although Jack's wife was just as unhappy in her marriage as he was, she forbid him to see Ina. So, the two sustained their romance through secret love letters written to each other.

Director(s) Michele Ohayon

Status In theaters (limited)

Release Date Nov. 9, 2007

Running Time 94 minutes

MPAA Rating Not Rated

OUR REVIEW
by Dave White

Who's in It: Jack Polak, Ina Soep, the voices of Jeroen Krabbé, Ellen Ten Damme

The Basics: Jack is unhappily married to Manja. And then he meets Ina, who turns out to be his soul mate. So he conducts a secret affair, mostly via letter-writing, with Ina even though Manja knows what's going on. Oh, yeah, one more thing: They're all Jewish and at a concentration camp during the Holocaust. And it's a documentary.

What's the Deal? Just when I think I've seen the last Holocaust documentary I ever need to see, along comes one that blows my mind. Maybe it's because the Holocaust itself was so beyond comprehension. Or maybe it's because this one starts with the now-93-year-old Polak saying, "I'm a very special Holocaust survivor. I was in a concentration camp with my wife and my girlfriend, and it was not easy." So, you know, not the sort of "we were so brave and morally upright" kind of thing you've come to expect and, therefore, completely fascinating.

Luck, Luck and More Luck: They were sent to Westerbork, the propaganda camp where they were all filmed and shown to the world as "happy." And because Soep was a diamond heiress, she knew the industry and could take shorthand and was put to work in a clerical capacity. And, finally all three of them avoided disease and slaughter and lived to the end of the war to continue their love triangle afterwards.

Dear Hollywood: Please don't make the fictionalized Life Is Beautiful version of this story. It would have to be called Life is Full of Messy Personal Stuff. You guys aren't good at capturing human complexity and these people are too difficult to put into an easy moral box, especially when Jack freely admits to things like denying his dying sister his own last crust of bread.