Schindler’s List was a film based on the true story of Oskar Schindler, a German businessman who employed Jews in Nazi-occupied Poland during WWII. Directed by American motion picture icon Steven Spielberg, Schindler’s List was a big-budget film backed with the all the “American-muscle horsepower” typical of a Hollywood film: music originally scored by John Williams, an internationally-renowned cast featuring Oscar-winning cast members such as Ben Kingsley, and cinematography shot with cameras valued equal to the price of a modest-sized home.
The “list” was comprised of over a thousand people detained in concentration camps, selected for work in Schindler’s enamelware and ammunition factory. Though many often consider Schindler to be more opportunistic entrepreneur than altruistic humanitarian, names listed on the historical documents were also lives spared from extermination camps such as Auschwitz. Presently, over 8,000 people trace ancestry from the Jews rostered for work in Schindler’s factories.
Where Oskar Schindler made history with a list, former Philippine President Manual Quezon made history with a game. During WWII, Manuel Quezon regularly played card games with foreign dignitaries and businessmen from around the world. Some of the dignitaries the president dealt hands with Quezon included the likes of Jewish businessmen and then-US-General Dwight D. Eisenhower. During these card games, commanding general of US forces in the European theater, Eisenhower brought to the attention the plight of the Jews. Compelled, Quezon devised plans for a Jewish diaspora to the Philippines.
Starring Raymond Bagatsing, Quezon’s Game is arguably considered a Filipino equivalent to Schindler’s List with the former Philippine president as focal point. Directed by Mathew E. Rosen, this ABS-CBN Star Cinema production was budgeted meagerly, valued at $500,000 compared with Universal Picture’s Academy-Award winning production estimated at $22 million in 1993. Released the end of last month in cinemas across the Philippines, Quezon’s Game is causing a buzz throughout the nation.
This Rappler.com review originally posted Sunday, June 2, gives Oggs Cruz’s take of the biopic currently showing in cinemas across the Philippines.
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Originally from Buffalo, New York, an area situated in America's former rust belt, like most Western New York natives, I am partly of Polish decent. I grew up immersed in the American football and hockey frenzy that often consumed the community. It was a great diversion from the socioeconomic problems that began to plague Buffalo in the end of its industrial heyday. It gave the people of Buffalo, often called "the city with no illusion," an escape from the mundane as they vicariously lived through sports figures, celebrities and dramas seen on television and the covers of magazines displayed on the checkout counters at supermarkets.
From a very young age, settling in a particular school or area was difficult. The instant I made friends and acquaintances, abruptly, it was time for me to move on and start over again. With minimal time to make lasting impressions, my encounters with people were like brief stops on a tour. Their memories of me as I had of them were not mutual, remembering them for the roles they played as film characters, viewing them from afar as merely an observer. Unlike many of the people encountered, whose path in life seemed definite and set out before them, I had had the privilege, sometimes at other’s expense, of living my life almost day to day, void of any commitment or obligations. Subsequently, my lifestyle has caught up with me. Trying to play different roles to different people and not being able to follow up with an end result has left things open ended.
However, all my travels on my seemingly limitless, open-ended journeys were not in vain. In retrospect it has given me a better understanding of the human condition everyone must inevitably face. Regularly transplanted from one setting to another, filled with different people and different places have given me a broader perspective in life, which has made me grateful for the friends, family and resources at my disposal.
After nearly a decade of living and working abroad throughout Asia, I presently reside in my hometown in suburban Buffalo. Though it has been wonderful to catch up with friends and family and have a taste of the local cuisine eaten since childhood, there is a void that can only be filled by memories abroad in countries such as Japan, South Korea and the Philippines. Memories of long-standing wooden shrines underscored by ever-changing electronic billboards, April cherry blossoms, and riding around in jeepneys will endure.
Returning to the USA was as though a claw from above forcibly lifted me by my shirt collar through the atmosphere across the Pacific, dropping me onto a bed of cold ice-packed snow beside an airport parking lot, making my long-awaited homecoming after visiting in the tropical Philippine Island of Boracay seem like a slap in the face. Unsure of how to exit the premises, agoraphobia set in. Overwhelmed by the vast and expansive landscape common in the US, momentarily, the airport car park seemed like an Arctic tundra during a calm after a storm nearing spring. It was a quite a contrast from Korea where within the same time taken to exit the airport, I would have been sitting comfortably on a train, enroute to my studio apartment.
It has been over a year since my last visit to Asia. Since my return, I have been diligently searching for a means to have one foot firmly planted in Asia and another firmly planted stateside. With the help of a dedicated staff and willing participants in the Philippines, Pinay Sisters celebrates the beauty of sisterhood. With a photo-journalistic approach, from the province villages to the urban neighborhoods of Manila, Pinay Sisters takes you throughout one of the world’s largest archipelagos with unique photos, stories and profiles featuring sisters from many walks of life updated monthly. Please enjoy. Positive criticism and feedback are greatly welcomed.
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