Flamboyant and full of life, Jewish prisoner Helena Citron found herself the subject of an unlikely affection at Auschwitz: Franz Wunsch, a high-ranking SS officer who fell in love with Helena and her magnetic singing voice. Their forbidden relationship lasted until her miraculous liberation.
Thirty years later, a letter arrived from Wunsch’s wife begging Helena to testify on Wunsch’s behalf in an Austrian court. She was faced with an impossible decision: should she help the man who brutalized so many lives, but saved hers, along with some of the people closest to her?
Follow her journey in Love It Was Not (86 minutes, Hebrew with English subtitles), an award-winning new documentary from Israeli director Maya Sarfaty and Austrian-Israeli producing team Nir Sa’ar and Kurt Langbein.
The film will be screened in person in the Museum’s Edmond J. Safra Hall. Tickets are $5 each for Museum members or $10 each for the general public. If you’re not a member, join today. If you’re already a member, log in and the member discount will be reflected in your cart.
Click here to view a discussion the Museum hosted with the filmmakers behind Love It Was Not in May 2020.
Hosted in partnership with Senior Programming Consultant Nancy Collet, founder of Cinema Collet.
Public programming at the Museum of Jewish Heritage – A Living Memorial to the Holocaust is made possible, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council; the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew M. Cuomo and the New York State Legislature; a Humanities New York CARES Grant with support from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the federal CARES Act; and other generous donors.
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