good back-story, and good acting

Admirable film.

It is neither dumb nor smart enough to be fun, and spends way too much time with its boring human characters.

There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

Another excellent holocaust film is 2003's "Out of the Ashes." A Jewish doctor who survived Auschwitz comes to New York after the war and passes her bar exams only to be examined by an inquiry determining her participation with Dr. Mengele at Auschwitz.Christine Lahti was absolutely terrific here. Her emotions as the outraged doctor were most convincing.The film relies on flashback to show that she came from an orthodox family who resisted fleeing to Israel as the elders felt they were too old to start life anew there.The movie showed how she was duped by Mengele which led to women going to their deaths. During this time at Auschwitz, she worked feverishly to save women; although, some of her methods came under intense scrutiny.A gem of a film.

Jessica Beitchman as Marta Weiss was the most captivating character of this piece. Considering the company she's keeping in the movie (Christine Lahti, Beau Bridges, Richard Crenna) that is an incredible accomplishment. The movie was a touching yet horrifying account of a female Doctor in a WW II concentration camp. In it, Doctor Gisella Perl (Christine Lahti) helps Marta Weiss (Jessica Beitchman) while imprisoned together in Auschwitz and the two are reunited once again in America. When the American authorities suspect the good Doctor of voluntarily participating in experiments conducted by the "Angel of Death" Dr Josef Minghela, Perl must now rely on the testimony provided by young Marta Weiss to help free her in the land she came to be free in, America. It is the extraordinary tale of the holocaust survivors that came to the USA after enduring the unimaginable while trapped in Nazi occupied Europe in the 1940's.

Out of the Ashes is one of the best portrayals of the life of a Holocaust survivor I have seen yet. As an avid researcher of the Holocaust I have read Dr. Perl's 1948 novel of her life as a concentration camp survivor and the accounts of her work as a camp doctor. Showtime could not have done a more superior job bringing this woman's story to the screen. This is certainly a movie that will grip at your heart strings , Jewish or not. Auschwitz was re-created with fierce accuracy. Even the most hardened heart could not feel anything but pure admiration as the story unfolds of Dr. Perl's struggle to help the women of Auschwitz and her own struggle for survival. Dr. Perl single handedly assisted in the preservation of the Jewish people by helping the innocent women victims to stay alive and fight with the hope that they would one day present the world with a new generation of Jews that would be free. She then came to America and assisted in delivering this new generation before she retired in Israel and ended her life there doing volunteer work. This is an extraordinary story of one of the bravest woman I have ever learned of. I could not give this movie a higher rating.

Joe Sargent was ruthless with the editing,the fast cuts pulled you right into the story, he made it move at a great pace.Don Morgan did a brilliant job on lighting - I love it when a DOP is not afraid to have faces drop into shadows. Beautiful texure throughout.Jeff Ginn did an absolute stellar job on production Design.The show felt like a feature film.Christine Lahti should be nominated for her role in this film