Holocaust survivor Margot Friedländer made an urgent appeal to filmmakers at the German Film Prize. «When I came back 14 years ago, I would never have dreamed of what is going on in public now. That’s how it started back then,” said the 102-year-old on Friday evening in Berlin.
Friedländer was accompanied on stage by director Wim Wenders and human rights activist Düzen Tekkal. “There are a lot of storytellers in this room. You have a responsibility to use the power of film to ensure that something like this never happens again,” she said. “I ask you to support me so that history does not repeat itself.” It is now in everyone’s hands to shape their lives. “We can no longer change what happened, but it must never, ever happen again. I ask you: be human.”
There was a standing ovation and thunderous applause from the audience for her speech. The 102-year-old Friedländer is one of the few living witnesses to the persecution and murder of Jews during the Nazi era.