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Korczak is the story of the Polish educator who cared for orphaned Jewish children. The director was Andrei Waida who is probably Poland's most distinguished film director. The movie is a dramatization of the final years of the heroic Polish pediatrician and child psychologist, Dr. Janusz Korczak. He ran a Jewish orphanage. The children like other Polish Jews were forced into the Warsaw Ghetto. After relocation to the Warsaw Ghetto he went with to continue caring for them. As a Christian he was not required by the NAZIs to do so. When the children were tranported to Treblinka in 1943 to be gassed Dr. Korczak insisted on accompaning them, again he was not required to do so. He died with the children in the gas chambers. We have an image from the film showing one of the older boys of the orphanage. He is an adolescent about 15 years old who falls in love with a non-Jewish girl and whom Dr. Korczak consoles by praising his incipient manhood. The costuming in the film is very accurate.
Korczak is the story of the Polish educator who cared for orphaned Jewish children. The producer is the renowned filmmaker Andej Wajda. He is probably Poland's most distinguished film director.
Poland had the largest Jewish popularion in Europe with the exception of the Soviet Union. It was in Poland that mass murder of the Jews began and was perfected. The death
camps were located in Poland not Germany. And in Poland the Germans found many willing to help them and few Poles intersted in protecting the Jews. Einsatzgruppen began killing
Polish Jews with the German invasion (September 1939). Most Polish Jews were forced into Ghettos. These ghettos were liuidated by the SS in 1942 following the Wannsee Conference: Lublin (March 1942); ghettos of Eastern and Western Poland (Spring 1942); and the Warsaw Ghetto (July-September 1942).
The movie is a dramatization of the final years of the heroic Polish pediatrician and child psychologist, Dr. Janusz Korczak. He ran a Jewish orphanage. The children like other Polish Jews were forced into the Warsaw Ghetto. After relocation to the Warsaw Ghetto he went with to continue caring for them. He was not required by the NAZIs to do so. When the children were tranported to Treblinka in 1943 to be gassed Dr. Korczak insisted on accompaning with them, again he was not required to do so. He died with the children in the gas chambers.
The two major boy characters are Joseph (the teenager, about 14-15 years old) who is played by
Polish actor Wojeiech Klata. Joseph is the oldest boy in the orphanage. He is about 15 or 16. The other principal boy character is Szloma, a much younger boy (about 8 or 9), who teases Joseph about his falling in love with a non-Jewish girl. Szloma is the younger boy whom you can see in the background of both photos.
We have an image from the film showing one of the older boys of the orphanage. He is an adolescent about 15 years old who falls in love with a non-Jewish girl and whom Dr. Korczak consoles by praising his incipient manhood. The boy's name was Joseph. The film also tells the story of Korczak who organized a way of life for Warshaw ghetto children until its closing, and the murder of the children at Treblinka.
The costuming in the film is very accurate. The adolescent is wearing a white shirt, dark short pants, and dark colored (probably brown) long stockings. Although the photo is rather dark, you can see the clasp of his stocking supporter at the hem of his shorts. He may be wearing a bodice or Leibchen under his shirt. The costuming seems very realistic in depicting the children's clothing. Many children are show wearing long over-the-knee stockings. This is unusual in that films of the era usually show boys in short pants wearing kneesocks, even though long stockings were quite common. For the filming, actual long stockings were used. Sometimes in films, tights are used rather than long stockings because they are easier to obtain and wear. One scene from the film shows a teenager after a younger boy in the Warsaw ghetto orphanage has just snatched a love letter that he was writing to a non-Jewish girl who lives outside the ghetto. She has been forbidden to see him anymore because he is Jewish. The teenager, who is the most prominent boy character in the film, is Joseph. The standard dress of boys in the ghetto consists of white shirts, short pants, and long brown stockings. In the picture you can see Joseph's stocking supporter at the hem
of his shorts (figure 1). The younger boy is Szloma. He teases Joseph about his amorous involvement with a gentile girl. Szloma wears the same style of clothing except that he is shown with a jacket.
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