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mtvU and Hillel Partner to Present “I’m Still Here”
April 15, 2008Comments (0) | Add | E-mail this to a friend “I’m Still Here: Real Diaries of Young People Who Lived During the Holocaust” DVD Arrives April 15 Leading Up to Holocaust Remembrance Day
New York, NY – April 15, 2008 - Leading up to Holocaust Remembrance Day, Emmy-nominated MTV News & Docs special, “I’m Still Here: Real Diaries of Young People Who Lived During the Holocaust” debuts on DVD April 15, 2008 from MTV Home Entertainment and SISU Home Entertainment.
Inspired by the award-winning book, Salvaged Pages: Young Writers’ Diaries of the Holocaust, the documentary brings to life first-hand accounts of young people who witnessed the horrors of the Holocaust. Through an emotional montage of archival footage, personal photos, and text from the diaries themselves, the film celebrates a group of brave, young writers who refused to quietly disappear. It is scored by Moby and diaries read by Elijah Wood, Ryan Gosling, Kate Hudson, Brittany Murphy, Joaquin Phoenix and others with personal ties to the tragedy.
In addition, mtvU, MTV's Peabody and Emmy-winning college network, is partnering with Hillel: The Foundation for Jewish Campus Life to present "I'm Still Here." The film will air on mtvU on Thursday May 1 at 8 p.m. local time to be screened by dozens of Hillels across the United States. The special presentation is an extension of mtvU's nearly four-year long, student-driven Sudan campaign to educate and empower college students to help end the "genocide in slow motion" that continues unabated in Darfur.
DVD special features include Genocide Today, MTV News segment, USHMM interview with Alexandra Zapruder, and printable study guide.
The diaries of these young people were collected for the first time in the award-winning book, Salvaged Pages: Young Writers’ Diaries of the Holocaust, written by Alexandra Zapruder and published in spring 2002 by Yale University Press. A founding staff member of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, Ms. Zapruder spent ten years compiling dozens of diaries kept by children and young adults during the Holocaust. Living in ghettos, in hiding, and as refugees, these young people recorded their experiences and impressions in any way they could: they smuggled paper, stole pencils, and wrote on the back of leaflets and in the margins of published books. Their determination to document their lives and to mark their places in the world speaks to the courage of each individual writer and the essential value of communication and legacy through the written word.
Directed by Lauren Lazin (“Tupac: Resurrection”), “I’m Still Here: Real Diaries of Young People Who Lived During the Holocaust” is part of MTV’s Emmy and Peabody Award-winning “Fight For Your Rights” anti-discrimination campaign. It is part of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum and Simon Wiesenthal Center’s permanent collection and was funded by MTV, Steven Spielberg’s Righteous Persons’ Foundation, The Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Foundation, and The Tauber Family Foundation.
Through a partnership with Facing History and Ourselves, MTV will offer its audience a way to learn more about and take action on the lessons in the documentary. Facing History is an international educational and professional development organization that engages students of diverse backgrounds in an examination of racism, prejudice, and anti-Semitism – in order to promote the development of a more humane and informed citizenry. The group has just launched a profile on Think.MTV.com, allowing young people to learn about the historical development of the Holocaust and other genocides, then make the essential connection between history and the moral choices they confront in their own lives.
I'm Still Here DVD is priced at $24.95 (U.S.) and will be available at major online stores, bookstores, Judaica Shops, major distributors, at local libraries or direct via Kol-Ami (www.sisuent.com, 1-800-223-7478).
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