Shoah

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Shoah

1985

9h 21m

Documentary

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Popcornmeter

100%

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38 Reviews

96%

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1,000+ Ratings

Director Claude Lanzmann spent 11 years on this sprawling documentary about the Holocaust, conducting his own interviews and refusing to use a single frame of archival footage. Dividing Holocaust witnesses into three categories -- survivors, bystanders and perpetrators -- Lanzmann presents testimonies from survivors of the Chelmno concentration camp, an Auschwitz escapee and witnesses of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, as well as a chilling report of gas chambers from an SS officer at Treblinka.

Critics Consensus

Expansive in its beauty as well as its mind-numbing horror, Shoah is a towering -- and utterly singular -- achievement in cinema.

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Kate Muir

The Times (UK)

Jan 9, 2015

5/5

Its riveting nine hours are perhaps the most important piece of historical cinema we possess.

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Kevin Thomas

Los Angeles Times

Jun 3, 2014

With his 9 1/2-hour Shoah, Claude Lanzmann has accomplished the seemingly impossible: He has brought such beauty to his recounting of the horror of the Holocaust that he has made it accessible and comprehensible.

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Jay Boyar

Orlando Sentinel

Jun 3, 2014

4/4

By straightforwardly presenting interviews with people who lived through the Holocaust, Lanzmann makes it real again. Even more impressively, he helps us to see how the horror could have happened.

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Noah Berlatsky

Everything is Horrible (Substack)

Sep 11, 2026

Lanzmann's goal is not really to describe or recreate the experience or the horror of the Holocaust. It is to show the inability of words, or images, or imagination, to make the experience and the horror present.

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Brian Eggert

Deep Focus Review

Feb 14, 2022

4/4

Shoah feels more essential than ever, demanding that its audience not just mourn and monumentalize the past, but experience it.

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Sabrina McFarland

Common Sense Media

Apr 5, 2021

4/5

Shoah remains today an essential film to educate about the history of the Holocaust and the issue of intolerance.

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Melven L.

@Melvenjdash May 2, 2026

9HR 21 MIN!!!!!!!🤯🤯🤯

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Mickey B.

@Mickerdoo Dec 26, 2025

I applaud this in depth, multi-sided account. Could be 6 hours with edit that cut translation time, long landscape shots & added visual aid.

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Doug J.

@Dougiefresh Dec 13, 2025

I saw Shoah in 1985 when it was released in the US. It is a profound, haunting insight regarding how people can be complicit to evil by inaction. I never believed we would see it again in our lifetimes until 2025.

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Dave S

@RT68722908 Mar 29, 2024

While it may not be the best documentary ever made, Shoah is most certainly the most impactful and the most important, as well as being remarkably timely when one considers the age in which we are living. Claude Lanzmann's horrifying epic, clocking in at over 9 hours, consists primarily of interviews with survivors, witnesses, and perpetrators of the Holocaust. Despite the intimidating running time, the film is compelling from start to finish, never shying away from the horrors of its subject, a sickening and stomach-churning viewing experience, but a viewing experience that needs to be seen. If there is one complaint, it is the use of the subtitles – too often, subtitles are provided for the interpreter's response to the subject's answer instead of simply providing the subtitles for the subject's response, effectively doubling the length of the interview, a problem considering the already considerable length of the film.

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S R

@ScottR Oct 24, 2023

1001 movies to see before you die. It took a long time to find this, but fortunately it turned up on YouTube. It is such an amazing accomplishment to have such an expansive, in depth view of the holocaust. It felt like it was incomplete and I was often a little confused to the structure. Regardless, I learned so much and appreciate this 10 year project.

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william d

@acsdoug May 19, 2022

Don't expect to learn why the Germans did what they did. There is no discussion of Nazi ideology here. What you will learn is what the Nazis did and the effect it had on its victims. It is both horrifying and mesmerizing at the same time.

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Claude Lanzmann

Director

Simon Srebnik

Self

Mordechaï Podchlebnik

Self

Richard Glazar

Self

Rudolf Vrba

Self

Inge Deutschkron

Self

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Synopsis

Director Claude Lanzmann spent 11 years on this sprawling documentary about the Holocaust, conducting his own interviews and refusing to use a single frame of archival footage. Dividing Holocaust witnesses into three categories -- survivors, bystanders and perpetrators -- Lanzmann presents testimonies from survivors of the Chelmno concentration camp, an Auschwitz escapee and witnesses of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, as well as a chilling report of gas chambers from an SS officer at Treblinka.

Director: Claude Lanzmann
Screenwriter: Claude Lanzmann
Production Co: Les Films Aleph, Ministère de la Culture de la Republique Française, Historia Films
Genre: Documentary
Original Language: French (France)
Release Date (Theaters): Oct 23, 1985, Limited
Rerelease Date (Theaters): Dec 10, 2010
Release Date (Streaming): Mar 2, 2021
Box Office (Gross USA): $15.6K
Runtime: 9h 21m

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