Henryk Schönker was born in 1931 in Kraków, the son of noted painter Leon Schönker and grandson of a wealthy Jewish industrialist. Shortly before the outbreak of war the Schönkers moved to Oświęcim, later to be more memorably named Auschwitz by the Nazis. At the beginning of the war Leon Schönker became the head of the German-imposed Jewish Council of the Elders of the local Jewish community and was tasked by the Germans with arranging for Jews to emigrate legally to other countries. Before the idea of Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp was conceived, the Office for Jewish Immigration to Palestine was established in Oświęcim in the autumn of 1939 which drew thousands of people to the town in the hope of being saved. Unfortunately, the idea of the legal emigration came to nothing because of the world’s indifference.
Now deaf and 85 years old, Schönker visits the traces of hiding places and bunkers. He returns to the Schönkers’ residence in Oświęcim, his aunt's house in Wieliczka and the walls of the former Tarnów ghetto to recount, often through tears, a series of near-death escapes, acts of kindness, upfront horrors and people who saved his family from death. Following the footsteps of his six-year wartime ordeal he reveals:
The horrible sounds of my childhood got inside me as if I were a seashell. Perhaps that is why I became deaf: so I would never forget them.
The film was shot in authentic interiors in Oświęcim, Kraków, Wieliczka, Bochnia and Tarnów. Pawłowski’s creative documentary introduces re-enactments and manipulated still images that seek to make the narrative come alive. Professional actors and numerous residents of Oświęcim play the real characters from the past. It also introduces the ‘archicollage’ (archive collage) style – an original invention of the director and the graphic designer Robert Manowski that is a new artistic means of recreating past events.
In 2016, The Touch of an Angel won the Gold World Medal at the 59th New York Festivals World’s Best TV & Films in documentary category, the Gold Remi at the 49th WorldFest-Houston Festival, the Award of Excellence at Docs Impact Awards and the Golden Teeth of Camera for the most interesting documentary film at 27th Polish Film Festival in America.
The Touch of an Angel is a coproduction between Polish Television and Westdeutscher Rundfunk with the support of Polish Film Institute, the Foundation for Polish-German Cooperation and Media, currently Creative Europe. The leading producer of the movie is Małgorzata Walczak Zoyda Art Production. The script written by Marek Tomasz Pawłowski is based on the memoirs Touch of an Angel by Henry Schönker, which was awarded the Historical Prize of the Polityka weekly in 2006.
- The Touch of an Angel (Dotknięcie anioła), script and direction: Marek Tomasz Pawłowski, cinematography: Jacek Januszyk, music: Michał Lorenc.
Sorce: Filmpolski.pl, Stowarzyszenie Filmowców Polskich, own materials, ed.BS, ed&transl. GS, May 2016