After reading Gross’ Neighbors and watching Pawlikowski’s Ida, I believe that the pieces of work compliment each other while sharing two different stories related to the horrific events that occurred during a time in history. While sharing two different stories related to World War II Poland, each work is able to share different details from different perspectives. Although both Neighbors and Ida give a fresh perspective to the horrors of World War II Poland, Neighbors seemed to read more like a secondary source to the events of the Jedwabne massacre. After explaining the events that took place leading up to the massacre, Gross proposes the argument that the Jedwabne massacre was committed by the Polish against their neighbors, the Polish Jews. Gross is then able to defend his argument with details of the massacre that he discovered through his historical research. In Ida, Pawlikowski uses the main character to reflect the effects of certain events like the German occupation of World War II on an individual. In the film, Ida is a young woman about to take her vows as a nun in the Polish Catholic Church in 1962. Before she becomes a nun, she must locate her aunt which takes her on a journey to locate the graves of her Jewish parents that were murdered during the German occupation of Poland. This journey of discovery leaves a long term effect on Ida and her identity. Although Pawlikowski’s Ida is more fictional and focuses on the story of one girl, I believe that it reflects the similar stories of the struggles of the small group of Poles affected by World War II Poland. By reading Gross’ Neighbors and watching Pawlikowski’s Ida, I am able to gain a more historical context on World War II Poland and the causes of the Jedwabne massacre while gaining a more personal and individual context on the effects of these events.
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