This response of Simone Veil to the detractors of the Holocaust, in the film simonedeeply challenged me: what conciseness, but also what virulence!
Everything is said there.
I was there endorses the veracity of the message while insisting on the unbearable duration of the horror inflicted on the victims of the Holocaust. This is not a fleeting incident that disappears as quickly as it appeared, but a tragedy that has become embedded in an indeterminate time – so well rendered by the use of the imperfect.
It was slaps like a whiplash that streaks consciences, too often anxious to hide past atrocities. It’s not just a Post-it note stuck to the bottom of a page, but rather a bloody corner planted right in the middle of our story.
The use of the past simple, dry, precise, nails this tragedy without appeal in the great historical continuum. I was there, it was, what a great way to respond to Holocaust deniers of all stripes who stubbornly deny what bothers them! A formula that would also be useful in these troubled times that we know.
To see in video