New film spotlights US antisemitism which prevented rescue of Jews from Nazi atrocities
By Isabel Vincent, The New York Post.
New York filmmaker Hilan Warshaw had no intention of beginning his documentary on Henry Morgenthau with darkness.
But after the Oct. 7 terrorist attacks in Israel last year, he felt he needed to make a statement about antisemitism — the same hate which dogged his subject, the former secretary of the Treasury during the Second World War.
“Honorable Mr. Morgenthau,” which premieres at the Quad Cinema Sept.13, plunges the viewer into several uncomfortable minutes of darkness, punctuated by angry snippets of audio from protesters screaming epithets like “Zionists need to die” — a refrain Warshaw heard often during pro-Palestinian protests in New York City earlier this year.
When I started making this film, I was determined not to put anything modern-day into it,” Warshaw said in an interview with The Post. “I wanted to tell the historical story as immersively as possible, without making contemporary parallels. But after October 7, I found the subject of my film facing me in the world we live in.