The Tattooist of Auschwitz

This is a fine series recounting the horrors of the nazi death camp, auschwitz. The story is told by Lali Sokolov, played in old age by Harvey Keitel who is recounting his story to budding Australian writer Heather Morris played by Melanie Lynskey.

It tells us how Lali became the Auschwitz tatooist which means he tatoo's the prison number on the arm of all new arrivals. In doing this he meets Gita, Anna Prochniak, and they immediately bond so he then seeks her out in the femail quarters where their relationship develops.

As the tatooist has relative freedom in the camp, with even his own room, an SS officer, Stefan Baretski played by Jonas Nay is appointed to supervise him. This, for me, was one of the most fascinating aspects of the story. A strange relationship develops between captive and captor. While Baretski demonstrates his evil side with violence and killing, including beating Lali occasionally, he is clearly not a happy soldier and uses Lali as an emotional crutch. To show a slightly more humane side to his character he often enables private meetings for Lali with Gita.

While auschwitz is shown as an evil place with frequent views of the gas chambers and incinerators, I still think that life for the average prisoner was much worse than portrayed here.

However this is a disturbing and also moving watch which I highly recommend.

In an era when 'Nazi' and 'Fascist' is frequently used to tarnish people for simply having a different opinion, often by people who should know better, this serves as a reminder of what Nazism and Fascism really is.

My main reason for this post is to correct all the ill-informed posters who have critisised Melanies portrayal of Heather Morris in this series. Author Heather Morris is a New Zealander, AS IS Melanie Lynskey!!!! Melanie used her native NZ accent, and it was accurate to a tee. She was never meant to be a British woman as so many seem to think. Lali resided in Melbourne, Australia and was interviewed by a New Zealand woman with a New Zealand accent. Okay, having explained all that, my Jewish wife and I were very disturbed by series despite having been totally familiar with the history of the appalling conditions and treatment in the camps. I did think that it was impossible to obtain actors and extras who could ever look as emaciated as the actual victims, but the message came across as strongly as intended. I do agree with others that young Lali did look and sound as if he had just graduated from Oxford University and would have benefited with an attempt at a Polish accent as all other parts were spoken with the various European accents. All in all, a valiant attempt at a forever difficult subject.

This was not an easy watch FOR ME. My paternal great grandparents were from Bohemia (now Slovakia previously Czechoslovakia during WW II) - they left during the 1918 pogroms. My maternal grandmother and her sister were put on an English Kindertransport ship to England (from German) after Kristallnacht in late 1938.

Lale, was what we were taught, a Kapo or Sonderkommando (you will need to watch the series to understand) I was finally able to watch this, as an adult with the necessary compassion, empathy, understanding and possibly even *forgiveness* that the Jewish people had "only 2 choices, the bad one or the worse one".

I do think they missed an opportunity to show just how bad conditions were in the camps, particularly given that Lale and Gita were in Birkenau for (I think) almost 3 years and we didn't see the brutal winters and oppressive summers or the starvation

The story is an *easy watching* Holocaust movie - an oxymoron if ever there was such a thing. It is primarily a love story with a smidgeon of brutality and depravity by the SS & Nazi's thrown in to give us a miniscule idea of life in the camps

Nonetheless, it is an important series to watch given the current rise of anti-semitism that is prevalent in the world today. It is a beautiful story filled with tenderness, love and hope

Harvey Keitel was outstanding. His performance as Lale (senior) had me sobbing. I will definitely re-watch this and even if you are not Jewish, not interested in WW II, not a fan of love stories - this is still an absolute must-watch. It is the kind of story that reminds us of the power of love and that we must never give up hope.

I created an account just to write this review. This is incredibly done. I can't believe that it only got a 6.0/10. I watched the entire series in one sitting and usually I physically cannot do that. What a story and I am so happy that I found this series.

The way that the cast depicted the story, is both haunting and beautiful. There was not a single thing that I saw that I said "no way, that's not real". This story is incredibly eye opening, I cannot recommend this series enough. Watch this at your own risk, there is a lot of violence, sexual content, etc.

This is not for the faint at heart, it gets very real and heavy.

I cannot understand people who downvote this because Melanie Lynskey's Australian accent is bad. Really? That's what you are concentrating on? Wooden acting? Do you expect people in that situation to be exuberant?

In a time when young people get their historical "knowledge" from TikTok and Facebook, it is very important that these events are not forgotten. It may not change the attitude of die-heart holocaust deniers but may inform some people who are on the fence.

Holocaust deniers and their supporters on X have to be counteracted with these first-hand accounts. Of course it is not a documentary but partially fictionalized but that is ok.

Having seen one of these tattoos myself, this is an excellent series that is especially needed with the rise in antisemitism.