At the Museum of Jewish Heritage—A Living Memorial to the Holocaust

(New York, NY) On Sunday, June 3 at 2:45 p.m., a special screening of Agnieszka Holland’s Oscar nominated Best Foreign Language Film, In Darkness (Poland, 2011, 114 min.), will take place at the Museum of Jewish Heritage – A Living Memorial to the Holocaust. A discussion with Krystyna Chiger Keren, the last living member of the group dramatized in the film, will follow the screening. This program is presented in conjunction with the Auschwitz Jewish Center.

Tickets are $10 and $7 for students and seniors, and $5 for members. Tickets are available online at www.mjhnyc.org or by calling the Museum box office at 646.437.4202.

Based on a true story, In Darkness follows Leopold Socha, a sewer worker and petty thief in Lvov, a Nazi occupied city in Poland. One day Socha encounters a group of Jews trying to escape the liquidation of the ghetto. He hides them for money in the labyrinth of the town’s sewers beneath the bustling activity of the city above. What starts out as a straightforward business arrangement turns into an unlikely alliance between Socha and the Jews for whom he risks his own life.

Agnieszka Holland, who is also the director of Europa, Europa among other films, writes, “Exploring the many stories from this period uncovers the incredible variety of human destinies and adventures, revealed in the richest texture of plots and dramas, with characters that face difficult moral and human choices, exercising both the best and the worst in human nature. One of those stories is Leopold Socha and the group of Jews from Lvov’s Ghetto. The main character is ambiguous: seemingly a good family man, yet a petty thief and a crook, religious and immoral at the same time, perhaps an ordinary man, living in terrible times. During the story, Socha grows in many ways as a human being. There is nothing easy or sentimental in his journey. This is why it’s fascinating; it’s why we can make this journey with him.”

Public programs are supported, in part, through the Edmond J. Safra Hall Fund.

About the Museum of Jewish Heritage
The Museum’s exhibitions educate people of all ages and backgrounds about the rich tapestry of Jewish life over the past century—before, during, and after the Holocaust.  Current special exhibitions include Emma Lazarus: Poet of Exiles, on view through December 2012; Let My People Go!: The Soviet Jewry Movement, 1967-1989, on view through August 5, 2012; and Filming the Camps: John Ford, Samuel Fuller, George Stevens: From Hollywood to Nuremberg, on view through October 14, 2012. It is also home to the award-winning Keeping History Center, an interactive visitor experience, and Andy Goldsworthy’s memorial Garden of Stones. The Museum offers visitors a vibrant public program schedule in its Edmond J. Safra Hall and receives general operating support from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs.

About the Auschwitz Jewish Center
The Auschwitz Jewish Center is operated by the Museum of Jewish Heritage – A Living Memorial to the Holocaust from the Museum’s New York City campus. The Center opened its doors in 2000 and joined with the Museum in 2006.  Located just three kilometers from the Auschwitz–Birkenau death camps, the Center provides a place for individuals and groups from around the world to pray, study, and learn about the vibrancy of Jewish culture before the war, and memorialize victims of the Holocaust.  The only Jewish presence in the vicinity of Auschwitz, the Center’s facilities include O?wi?cim’s only surviving synagogue.