God on Trial (2008)

Directed by

Andy De Emmony

Genre

drama film

Country

United Kingdom

Runtime

1h 30m

Rated

PG

Rating

6.8 of 10 from 71 voters

Elsewhere

IMDb

How it feels

Jewish prisoners in Auschwitz conduct a trial in absentia for God, debating whether he has broken his covenant with them by allowing the Holocaust. The men argue over God's guilt or innocence as they face their own impending deaths.

sombercontemplativeclaustrophobicstarkintellectualunsettlingheavytheatrical

What happens

God on Trial is a 2008 British television play written by Frank Cottrell-Boyce, starring Antony Sher, Rupert Graves and Jack Shepherd. The play takes place in Auschwitz during World War II. The Jewish prisoners put God on trial in absentia for abandoning the Jewish people. The question is whether God has broken his covenant with the Jewish people by allowing the Germans to commit genocide on them. It was produced and shown by the BBC on 3 September 2008. Production was supported by PBS, which screened the play as part of its Masterpiece anthology. The play is based on the Elie Wiesel play The Trial of God. Cottrell-Boyce describes this tale as "apocryphal". Wiesel later stated that the event was true, and that he had witnessed it. According to Cottrell-Boyce, producer Mark Redhead "had been trying to turn the story into a film for almost 20 years by the time he called me in 2005 to write the screenplay." (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

Trailer

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