Veteran actor Robert Davi (Die Hard, The Goonies) plays the strong, defiant Jewish leader Rafuel Lowy in the new Holocaust drama Bardejov, which tells the compelling story of how a small Jewish community in a Slovakian town cunningly worked to save themselves from certain death in the early days of World War II.
Bardejov premiered to a packed theater in Hollywood on Wednesday night, earning considerable applause and praise from those in attendance, which included actors Tobey Maguire and Lukas Haas as well as former Disney Music Group chairman Bob Cavallo. Speaking with Breitbart News on the red carpet ahead of the screening, actor Robert Davi, who previously directed My Son Hunter, said the film sends a message of defiance.
“Well, it’s a story about empowerment, about courage, about fighting back, about not playing the victims and finding a way,” said Davi.
“My character (Rafuel Lowy) was defiant,” added Davi. “And, in many Holocaust films, you don’t find that spirit and character.”
Paul Bois / Breitbart NewsIndeed, Bardejov joins the ranks of Holocaust films like Edward Zwick’s Defiance or Jack Gold’s Escape from Sobibor by telling a story of heroism, bravery, and survival in the face of the Nazi death machine rather than victimhood. Like Oskar Schindler or Tuvia Bielski, Rafuel Lowy could be listed among the many great Holocaust heroes whose brave acts of defiance saved many lives and whose descendants can be traced up to the present day. Some were even in attendance at the screening on Wednesday night and thanked Robert Davi for his sensitive portrayal of a beloved hero. The film’s producer, Emil Fish, grew up in the town of Bardejov and was sent to the Buchenwald concentration camp at the age of 9 before being liberated by the British army in 1945.
As for the film itself, Bardejov becomes a rather tense story in its third act as Rafuel Lowy and his collaborators devise an ingenious plan to save a group of girls from being shipped to the Auschwitz death camp by injecting them with a large dosage of typhus serum to give off the appearance of an outbreak and force a quarantine on the small town. It is in those scenes that the movie finds its stride and the actors deliver some of the film’s best performances, especially Robert Davi, who successfully walks the difficult tightrope between portraying courageous stoicism and fretful apprehension.
Director Daniel A. Abeckaser (The Engineer) told Breitbart News ahead of the premiere that Bardejov should be seen as a “triumph story” and one that can educate people. Though the movie went into production prior to the horrific terrorist attack in Israel at the hands of Hamas on October 7 of last year, the film’s makers were well aware of Bardejov‘s significance in the wake of that horrific atrocity. During the Q&A, for instance, Davi discussed the importance of keeping the Holocaust’s memory alive.
Paul Bois / Breitbart NewsDistributed by Gravitas Ventures, Bardejov will be available on various VOD platforms come March 19, including Amazon, AppleTV, Google Play, Vudu, and others. Pre-order today.
Paul Roland Bois directed the award-winning feature film, EXEMPLUM, which can be viewed for FREE on YouTube or Tubi. “Better than Killers of the Flower Moon,” wrote Mark Judge. “You haven’t seen a story like this before,” wrote Christian Toto. A high-quality, ad-free stream can also be purchased on Google Play or Vimeo on Demand. Follow him on Twitter @prolandfilms or Instagram @prolandfilms.
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