Triumph of the Spirit is a 1989 film, directed by Robert M. Young and starring Willem Dafoe and Edward James Olmos.
The majority of the film is set in the death camp at Auschwitz during the Holocaust and details how Nazi SS guards forced Jewish boxer Salamo Arouch to fight other internees to the death for their entertainment. Prior to Triumph of the Spirit, no major feature film had ever been shot on location at Auschwitz.
It has been suggested t...
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Triumph of the Spirit is a 1989 film, directed by Robert M. Young and starring Willem Dafoe and Edward James Olmos.
The majority of the film is set in the death camp at Auschwitz during the Holocaust and details how Nazi SS guards forced Jewish boxer Salamo Arouch to fight other internees to the death for their entertainment. Prior to Triumph of the Spirit, no major feature film had ever been shot on location at Auschwitz.
It has been suggested that the name of the film is a paraphrase of the infamous Nazi film Triumph of the Will by Leni Riefenstahl (1935).
Young was reluctant to make the film when he was first approached with the script, finding the topic too momentous to cover; he only agreed to direct when provided a script that focused only on one small element, "like a cork, bubbling on the surface of the sea." The film, which positions Arouch as a witness to the horrors of the Holocaust, was shot on a budget of US $12 million dollars. Filming with permission at Auschwitz...
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