Overview
In Darkness is a 2011 Polish drama film written by David F. Shamoon and directed by Agnieszka Holland. It was nominated for Best Foreign Language Film at the 84th Academy Awards.
Based on true events during German occupation of Poland, the film tells about Leopold Socha, a sewer worker in the Polish city of Lwów. He used his knowledge of the city's sewer system to shelter a group of Jews who had escaped from the Lwów Ghetto during the Holocaust in Poland.
Plot
In Darkness is a dramatization of a rescue of Jewish refugees during World War II in the German-occupied city Lwów (Lemberg in German, L'viv in Ukrainian). For over a year, a Polish Catholic sewer maintenance worker and burglar, Leopold Socha along with his friend and co-worker Szczepek Wróblewski, hid and cared for a group of Polish Jews who had escaped the massacres and deportations during the liquidation of the Lwów Ghetto. At first the men demand daily payment for their help but they continue to aid the group long after the Jews' money has run out and aiding them had become ever more dangerous. The Jewish ghetto had been established in 1941 and the Nazis decided to liquidate it in June 1943. The Soviets took over Lwów city in July 1944, by which point Socha's band made up 10 of the fewer than 1,000 surviving Jews in the city. Socha's and Wróblewski's actions and those of their wives led to their recognition as Righteous Among the Nations recipients.
Cast
Robert Więckiewicz as Leopold Socha
Benno Fürmann as Mundek Margulies
Agnieszka Grochowska as Klara Keller
Maria Schrader as Paulina Chiger
Herbert Knaup as Ignacy Chiger
Kinga Preis as Wanda Socha
Krzysztof Skonieczny as Szczepek Wróblewski
Julia Kijowska as Chaja
Marcin Bosak as Janek Weiss
Jerzy Walczak as Jakob Berestycki
Michał Żurawski as Bortnik
Piotr Głowacki as Jacek Frenkiel
Zofia Pieczyńska as Stefcia Socha
Etel Szyc as Szona Grossman
Andrzej Mastalerz as Sawicki
Ida Łozińska as Rachela Grossman
Laura Lo Zito as Irena
Alexander Levit as Kovalev
Frank Köbe as Gustav Wilhaus
From Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0).